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Digitized  by  the  Internet  Archive 

in  2011  with  funding  from 

Princeton  Theological  Seminary  Library 


http://www.archive.org/details/opencommunionorpOO 


©pen  (fammmm; 


THE  PRINCIPLES  OF  RESTRICTED  COMMUNION 


EXAMINED   AND   PROVED   TO   BE 


UNSCRIPTURAL    AND    FALSE, 


In  u  Btxm  jof  f  rttm  to  i  Jronir, 


BY  S.   W..  WHITNEY,  A.M., 

Late  Pastor  of  the  Baptist  Church,  Westport,  N.  Y, 


This  do  in  remembrance  of  me." 
"Drink  ye  all  of  it." 


NEW    YORK: 

PUBLISHED      BY      M.      W.      DODD, 

CORNER   OF    SPRUCE    ST.  AND    CITY   HALL   SQUARE. 
1853. 


Entered,  according  to  Act  of  Congress,  in  the  year  1853,  by 

S.    W.    WHITNEY, 

In  the  Clerk's  Office  of  the  District  Court  of  the  Southern  District 
of  New  York. 


K.  CKAIGUEAD,  PRINTER  AND  STEREOTYPKK, 

53  Yesey  street,  X.  Y. 


m 


tyxthn. 


*     -T 


: 


*^Vff*^ 


The  design  of  this  little  volume  is  to  bring  to  the  test 
of  Scripture  and  reason  both  the  principles  upon  which 
the  close  communion  of  the  Baptist  denomination  in 
this  country  professes  to  proceed,  and  those  upon  which 
it  actually  does  proceed.  The  writer  is  a  Baptist ;  and 
his  object  has  been  to  take  a  candid  view,  as  a  Baptist, 
of  the  real  force  of  the  arguments  urged  by  his  brethren 
in  defence  of  their  practice.  His  letters  are  neither 
more  nor  less  than  the  argument  of  a  Baptist  with  a 
Baptist.  He  has  taken  nothing  as  conceded  which 
restricted  communionists  do  not  concede,  or  for  which 
he  has  not  been  able  to  refer  to  their  writings  to  sustain 
him.  At  the  same  time,  he  has  avoided  urging  any 
plea  in  his  defence  which  might  be  likely  not  to  weigh 
with  a  Baptist  mind  as  such.  Hence  he  has  left  un- 
touched, besides  other  arguments,  that  deduced  from 
the  scriptural  injunction  of  brotherly  love,  so  ably  set 
forth  by  Hall,  Mason,  Noel,  and  others ;  for  to  a  Bap- 
tist mind  the  argument  has  no  force  whatever.  It  is 
not  on  this  ground  that  he  has  placed  the  question  at 
all.  He  is  perfectly  willing  the  practice  should  stand 
or  fall  upon  the  truth  or  falsity  of  the  ground  on  which 
its  advocates  place  it ;  and  his  inquiry  has  been — Is  this 
ground  true  or  false  ?  Believing,  as  he  does,  that  it  is 
demonstrably  false,  he  feels  it  to  be  a  duty  that  he  owes 


IV  PREFACE. 

to  his  God,  his  brethren,  and  to  the  church  at  large,  to 
prove  it,  and  to  give  his  proof  to  the  public.  This  he 
now  does.  From  some  who  differ  from  him  he  knows 
what  to  expect.  But  he  is  happy  to  know,  on  the 
other  hand,  that  there  are  many,  and  Baptists  too,  who 
will  welcome  his  humble  effort  as  a  token  of  the  dawn 
of  a  coming  brighter  day. 

That  the  volume,  as  it  now  goes  forth  to  the  public, 
may  be  accompanied  with  the  Divine  blessing,  and  aid 
in  doing  away  with  one  of  the  most  uncalled  for  and 
unscriptural  bars  to  the  full  intercommunion  of  Chris- 
tians in  things  emblematic  of  their  union  to  Christ  and 
to  one  another  as  members  of  his  family,  is  the  sincere 
prayer  of  the  author. 

S.  W,  WHITXEY, 

Flushing,  L.  L,  May  1,  1853, 


:• 


CnttiVttta. 

. 


.- 

LETTER  I. 

ON   THE   WORD    CHURCH. 

Page 
Introduction  —  The  Baptist  position  respecting  the 
word — Its  true  meaning,  a  collection  of  Christians 
— Those  in  any  city — In  any  family — Not  organi- 
zations— The  Baptist  definition  of  a  church  not 
descriptive  of  apostolic  churches  —  Pedobaptist 
churches  as  truly  N.  T.  churches  as  any  other — 
The  church,  a  designation  for  the  body  of  Christ's 
disciples  in  the  world — Equivalent  to  "  the  house- 
hold of  faith" — Examples — Baptist  concessions — 
The  nature  of  this  body — How  entered — Who  are 
its  members — Baptizing  into  the  fellowship  of  par- 
ticular churches,  not  a  scriptural  act —  Conclu- 
sion  13 


LETTER  II. 

THE   POINT    OF    DIFFERENCE    BETWEEN    OPEN    AND    CLOSE 
COMMUNION1STS. 

Not  respecting  the  terms  of  membership    in    Bap- 
tist churches — Not  respecting  the  propriety  of  com- 


L  ©©STENTS. 

Page 
miming  with  non-professors — Not  respecting  the 
order  of  administering  the  ordinances  to  new  con- 
verts— Not  whether  Baptists  are  as  free  as  others 
or  not — But  whether  it  is  proper  for  them  to  com- 
mune at  the  Lord's  table  with  unimmersed  mem- 
bers of  the  Christian  church S& 


LETTER  III. 

BAPTISM    NOT    A    TERM   OF   COMMUNION. 

Introduction — Baptists  themselves  deny  baptism  to- 
be  a  sine  qua  non  for  communion — The  want  of 
baptism  not  a  disqualification  in  the  apostles' 
days — The  communicants  at  the  first  supper  were 
without  Christian  baptism — Proofs  that  JohnV 
baptism  was  not  Christian  baptism — (1.)  Their  ob- 
ject and  import  distinct — (2.)  A  distinction  care- 
fully preserved  between  them  by  the  N.  T.  writers- 
— (§.)  John's  disciples  after  the  resurrection  rebap- 
tized — (4.)  Christian  baptism  not  instituted  till' 
after  the  resurrection — (5.)  Christian  baptism  an 
ordinance  of  Christ's;.  John's  was  not — Others  be- 
sides the  eleven  disciples  communed  steadfastly 
without  baptism — Conclusion.      ..        .         .         .     4T 

LETTER  IT. 

BAPTISM    NOT    A    TERM    OF    COMMUNION. 

The  Lord's  Supper,  an  ordinance  for  the  Saviour's 
disciples — Baptist  concessions — The  assertion  thai 


CONTEXTS.  Vrt 

P.ig« 
open  communionists,  in  denying  baptism  to  be  a 
term  of  communion,  differ  from  all  Christendom, 
untrue — No  proof  from  the  commission  that  bap- 
tism is  indispensable  to  communion — None  from 
the  practice  of  the  apostles ;  an  absurd  and  suici- 
dal appeal — None  from  the  signification  of  the 
ordinances;  proof  for  the  contrary — None  from 
the  terms  of  eating  the  Jewish  passover — Conclu- 
sion  11 

LETTER  V. 

THE   WANT   OF    BAPTISM   NOT   THE   TRUE    GROUND  UPON  WHICH 
RESTRICTED    COMMUNION    PROCEEDS. 

Close  communionists  require  something  more  than 
repentance,  faith,  and  baptism — The  supper  made 
a  denominational  ordinance — The  insincerity  of 
Baptists — Their  reasons  for  making  it  a  deno- 
minational ordinance,  no  reasons — Their  practice 
inconsistent  with  their  professions — The  folly  of 
contending  for  baptism  as  a  term  of  communion.   .  98 

LETTER  VI. 

COMMUNION    NOT   A   SYMBOL    OF   INDIVIDUAL    CHURCH 
FELLOWSHIP. 

A  third  ground  of  defence — A  strange  position — A 
false  one — No  proof  to  sustain  it — Proof  against  it 
— An  example  of  a  particular-church  ordinance — If 
this  ground  of  defence  is  good,  useless  to  talk  of 
baptism  as  a  term  of  communion,  or  of  other  Bap- 


VI 11  CONTENTS. 

Page 
tists  as  disorderly  walkers — The  position  falsified 
by  the  universal  practice  of  restricted  communion- 
ists— What  is  necessary  to  a  right  reception  of  the 
ordinance—The  presence  of  a  minister  not  neces- 
sary— Andrew  Fuller's  opinion — Examples  of  apos- 
tolic communion;  at  Tezpoor;  at  the  sessions  of 
the  Evangelical  Alliance,  London,  1851— Conclu- 
sion  116 

LETTER  VII. 

CONCLUDING    CONSIDERATIONS. 

Restricted  communion  an  uncandid  system—Places 
others  in  a  false  light,  unchurching  them  and  plac- 
ing them  on  a  level  with  unbelieving  Jews,  <fec— 
The  true  position  of  Pedobaptists  illustrated— 
The  fact  not  to  be  overlooked  that  all  were  agreed 
in  the  apostles'  days  as  to  what  baptism  was,  not 
so  now — Close  communion  clashes  with  the  spirit 
of  Christ — The  sad  shifts  often  made  in  conse- 
quence.— The  practice  schismatic — As  a  policy, 
false — Dr.  Carson's  testimony — A  desecration  of 
the  Lord's  supper — A  modern  innovation — Con- 
clusion,        ,.,.,,,.  132 


%&> 


LETTER  I. 


ON    THE    WORD    CHURCH. 


Introduction — The  Baptist  position  respecting  the  word 
— Its  true  meaning,  a  collection  of  Christians — Those 
in  any  city — In  any  family — Xot  organizations — The 
Baptist  definition  of  a  church  not  descriptive  of  apos- 
tolic churches — Pedobaptist  churches  as  truly  N".  T. 
churches  as  any  other — The  church,  a  designation 
for  the  body  of  Christ's  disciples  in  the  world — Equi- 
valent to  "  the  household  of  faith" — Examples — 
Baptist  concessions — The  nature  of  this  body — How 
entered — Who  are  its  members — Baptizing  into  the 
fellowship  of  particular  churches,  not  a  scriptural  act 
— Conclusion. 

Mr  Dear  Friend  : — You  have  now  laid  before 
me,  one  by  one,  your  reasons  for  adhering  to  the 
practice  of  restricted  communion.  Your  position 
is,  that  you  have  no  right  to  commune  at  the 
Lord's  table  with  any  but  believers  who  have 
made  an  immersional  profession  of  Christianity. 


14  OPEN    COMMUNION. 

Your  argument  is,  that  none  others  are  in  the 
church  as  Christ  constituted  it ;  that  the  Lord's 
supper  is  for  these  alone  ;  and  that,  inasmuch  as 
we  are  called  upon  to  preserve  the  constitution  of 
the  church  in  its  original  form,  and  to  keep  the 
ordinances  as  they  have  been  delivered  to  us,  you 
are  not  at  liberty  to  commune  with  unbaptized 
churches,  or  even  with  those  who,  though 
baptized,  practise  intercommunion  with  such 
churches.  Your  reasons  for  holding  these  views 
I  have  carefully  weighed  ;  and  yet,  however  much 
I  agree  with  you  as  a  Baptist,  I  cannot  see  the 
force  of  your  arguments  as  a  close  communionist. 
To  my  mind  your  reasoning  is  palpably  more  or 
less  unfounded  and  illogical,  and  altogether  incon- 
clusive. And  if  you  will  bear  with  me  I  will 
endeavor  to  show  you  wherein  your  argument  is 
inconsistent  with  truth  and  with  several  of  your 
own  concessions. 

It  is  important,  then,  that  we  determine,  in  the 
first  place,  whether  Pedobaptist  assemblies  are 
scriptural  churches  or  not,  that  is,  churches  in  a 
scriptural  sense  of  the  word  ;  and  whether  church 
does  or  does  not,  in  the  language  of  the  Holy 
Ghost,  sometimes  denote  the  body  of  professing 
Christians  among  men.  You.  say,  in  common 
with  the  denomination,  that  "  a  visible  church  of 
Christ  is  a  congregation  of  baptized  [immersed] 


ON    THE    WORD    CHURCH.  15 

believers,  associated  by  covenant  in  the  faith  and 
fellowship  of  the  gospel  ;"*  which,  if  true,  would 
leave  Christ  without  any  churches  in  the  world 
but  Baptist  churches.  Again,  you  say  that  you 
agree  with  Dr.  Fuller  that  the  word  church  has, 
in  the  Bible,  but  two  meanings  ;  that  it  denotes 
either  "  a  visible  church  of  Christ,"  or  the  spiritual 
body  of  all  who  are  converted ;  that  it  is  never 
applied  to  the  body  of  professing  Christians  in 
the  world,  but  that  this  use  of  the  word  "  is  a 
tertium  quid  unknown  to  the  Bible."f  On  both 
these  points,  however,  I  am  compelled  to  differ 
with  you. 

I  admit  that  the  word  is  often  used,  as  in  Eph. 
i.  22,  to  denote  the  body  of  the  redeemed,  the 
spiritual  church  as  it  is  sometimes  called.  But 
that  this  is  the  only  meaning,  except  one,  which 
the  word  has  when  applied  to  a  religious  body,  is 
a  conclusion  to  which  you  must  have  come  with- 
out due  examination  ;  for  no  impartial  student  of 
the  New  Testament  can  admit  that  the  only  other 
sense  in  which  the  word  is  used,  is,  to  denote  an 
organized  society  of  Christians,  or  indeed  that  the 

*  See  Encyclopaedia  of  Religious  Knowledge,  Art.  Bap- 
tism ;  and  Articles  of  Faith  of  Baptist  churches  gene- 
rally. 

f  See  R.  Fuller  on  Bap.  and  Com. ;  Curtis  on  Com., 
tfcc. 


16  OPEN    COMMUNION. 

idea  of  organization  has  anything  to  do  with  it. 
This  idea  does  not  enter  into  the  word  sxxXyjtfia 
at  all.  The  word,  in  its  ordinary  acceptation 
among  the  Greeks,  signified  merely  an  assembly,  a 
body  of  people  called  together  by  some  circum- 
stance or  other.  And  when  used  in  a  religious 
sense  in  the  New  Testament,  it  denotes  simply  a 
collection  of  Christians — any  collection.  That  is 
to  say,  a  Christian  church,  or  church  of  God, 
according  to  the  New  Testament  idea  of  a  church, 
is  neither  more  nor  less  than  an  asssembly  or 
body  of  Christians,  without  any  reference  to 
organization,  size,  or  manner  of  assembly.  Some- 
times the  word  denotes  what  we  denominate  a 
meeting :  that  is,  it  refers  to  Christians  in  the 
capacity  of  an  assembled  congregation  engaged  in 
worship  or  met  together  for  worship.  Almost  the 
only  passages,  however,  in  which  it  has  this 
meaning,  are  1  Cor.  xiv.  19,  28,  33,  34,  35.*  In 
other  places  it  is  applied  to  the  body  of  Christians 
residing  or  sojourning  together  in  the  same  city 
or  town.  This  use  of  the  word  is  very  common. 
The  idea  of  an  assembly  is  still  preserved  in  it ; 
but  it  is  with  reference  to  individuals  congregated 

*  In  Acts  xix.  32,  39,  41,  -where  it  is  translated 
"  assembly,"  it  has  this  meaning,  though  not  with  refer- 
ence to  a  body  of  Christians. 


ON    THE    WORD    CHURCH.  lV 

and  dwelling  or  sojourning  together  within  the 
precincts  of  the  same  city  or  village.  Thus,  we 
read  of  "the  church  which  was  at, Jerusalem,"* 
"  the  church  of  the  Laodiceans,"f  "  the  church  of 
Ephesus;"J  these  several  expressions  denoting  the 
company  of  Christians  at  Jerusalem,  at  Laodicea, 
at  Ephesus,  embracing  every  visible  saint  in  the 
city.  If  the  word  were  similarly  used  by  us,  it 
would  denote,  when  we  spoke  of  the  church  of 
God  in  New  York  or  in  any  other  place,  the 
entire  body  of  the  acknowledged  people  of  God  in 
that  place.  This,  however,  is  a  use  of  the  word 
which  is  entirely  ignored  at  the  present  day. 
We  never  hear  of  the  church  of  God  in  any  parti- 
cular place  as  a  term  denoting  all  the  professing 
Christians  who  reside  or  sojourn  there,  unless 
they  happen  to  belong  to  one  organized  congre- 
gation, and  have  their  names  entered  upon  the 
same  church  roll.  Nor  is  it  to  be  wondered  at 
that  such  is  the  case,  when  we  consider  how  the 
existence  of  denominations  keeps  Christians,  even 
in  small  villages,  at  a  distance  one  from  another, 
and  breaks  up  that  apostolic  unity  which  was 
originally  felt  among  all  Christians  who  resided 
in  the  same  immediate  neighborhood. 

It  is  also  used  with  reference  to  smaller  com- 

*  Acts  viii.  1.         f  Col.  iv.  16.        \  Rev.  ii.  1. 
2* 


18  OPEN    COMMUNION. 

panies  or  bands  of  Christians.  Thus,  while  we 
find  the  Christian  community  at  Ephesus  spoken 
of  as  the  church  of  Ephesus,  we  read,  in  distinc- 
tion from  this,  of  the  church  at  the  house  of 
Aquila  and  Priscilla,*  who  then  resided  at 
Ephesus,  and  the  church  at  whose  house  formed 
but  a  part  of  the  Ephesian  church,  or  body  of 
Christians   in    that   city.      Again,  the   Christian 

band  at  Colosse  was  the  church  of  the  Colossians. 

i 

And  yet,  within  this  church,  we  read  of  the 
church  at  the  house  of  Nymphas,f  and  again,  of 
the  church  at  the  house  of  Philemon.J  These 
churches  may  have  been  the  Christian  members 
of  these  several  families — the  body  of  disciples 
who  dwelt  together  and  composed  the  same 
household  ;  or  they  may  have  been  the  Christian 
circles  that  met  at  these  different  houses,  from  time 
to  time,  for  religious  purposes  ;  for  these  houses 
appear  to  have  been  the  dwellings  of  such  as 
were  ordained  to  watch  over  the  spiritual  interests 
of  the  Christians  in  their  midst,  of  which  there 
were  probably  a  number  in  every  city  where 
there  were  Christians,  like  Paul's  own  hired 
house  in  Rome ;  for  we  read  of  a  plurality  of 
elders    or    bishops    being    ordained    "in    every 

*  1  Cor.  xvi.  19.  f  Col.  iv.  15. 

%  Comp.  Philem.  ii.  10,  12,  with  Col.  iv.  8,  9. 


ON    THE  .WORD    CHURCH.  19 

city,"*  or  "in  every  church,"  as  it  is  elsewhere 
expressed,!  church  here  denoting  the  Christian 
body  in  the  cities  spoken  of  in  the  context. 

Thus  we  perceive  what  apostolic  churches  were. 
They  were  not,  like  modern  churches,  organiza- 
tions which,  on  the  one  hand,  include  no  one 
whose  name  is  not  on  their  rolls,  however  exem- 
plary may  be  his  walk  as  a  professing  Christian  or 
constant  his  attendance  upon  divine  services  with 
them ;  or,  on  the  other  hand,  embrace  every  indi- 
vidual whose  name  is  on  their  records,  whether 
he  resides  in  Maine,  or  California,  or  the  Celestial 
Empire,  or  nobody  knows  where,  while  the 
church  to  which  he  belongs,  may  be  in  the  heart 
of  the  American  Union.  They  were  not  orga- 
nizations of  any  sort.  That  is  .to  say,  while 
they  had  their  elders  or  bishops  and  their 
deacons,  as  cities  now  have  their  mayors  and 
aldermen,  they  were  not  covenanted  together  in 
church  relations,  their  names  enrolled  upon  a 
piece  of  parchment,  and  each  church  consisting 
only  of  the  individuals  thus  associated  together. 
They  were  companies  of  Christians,  in  a  sense 
more  or  less  general,  of  which  every  individual 
Christian  among  them  was  a  member,  and  those 

*  Tit.  i.  5, 7. 

f  Acts  xiv.  23.  Comp.  Acts  xx.  17.  28.  1  Tim.  hi.  2, 
4,  v.  17. 


20  OPEN    COMMUNION. 

who  were  miles  away  from  them  and  rarely  or 
never  appeared  among  them,  were  not  members. 
This  will  suffice  to  show  not  only  that  the  com- 
mon idea  of  a  church,  as  an  organization,  is  not 
a  scriptural  one,  but  that  the  supposition  that 
visible  churches  are  divinely  organized  societies, 
receives  no  support  either  from  the  meaning  of 
the  word  ixxXyjtfia,  or  from  the  acts  and  circum- 
stances of  the  apostles  and  first  Christians.  It 
shows,  too,  that  your  definition,  or  rather  I  should 
say,  the  Baptist  definition  of  a  visible  church,  is 
radically  defective.  In  the  first  place,  it  denies  to 
Pedobaptist  congregations,  which  are  as  truly 
churches  of  Christ  as  any  other,  their  right  to  this 
appellation ;  since  jtheir  members  are  generally 
unimmersed.  So  far  as  they  are  organizations,  it 
is  true  they  possess  an  element  unknowrn  to  the 
ixx\ri<fiai  of  the  New  Testament ;  but  as  bands  of 
Christians  they  are  what  are  denominated  in 
Scripture  churches  of  God.  They  are,  therefore, 
quite  as  much  scriptural  churches  as  any  other 
among  us,  though  in  certain  points  they  may  be 
less  conformed  than  others  to  the  doctrines  and 
practice  of  primitive  Christians.  Again,  if  churches 
of  Christ  are  limited  to  "  congregations  covenanted 
together  for  purposes  of  worship,"  as  your  de- 
finition certainly  implies,  then  the  body  of  Chris- 
tians in  New  York,  or  Philadelphia,  or  any  other 


ON    THE    WORD    CHURCH.  21 

city,  cannot  be  a  church  of  Christ ;  a  position  at 
variance  with  what  is,  perhaps,  the  most  frequent 
New  Testament  use  of  the  word.  Your  definition, 
too,  virtually  declares  that  Peter,  James,  and  John 
were  not  members  of  the  church  at  Jerusalem  ;* 
for,  as  I  shall  show  in  a  future  letter,  they  were 
not  "  believers  who  by  baptism,  that  is  to  say,  by 
immersion,  had  professed  themselves  disciples  of 
the  Saviour."f  In  short,  it  makes  it  out  that  there 
were  no  such  things  as  "  churches  of  Christ"  in 
the  apostles'  days,];  not  even  one  at  Jerusalem ; 
the  members  of  the  churches  of  the  New  Tes- 
tament not  having  been  associated  and  bound 
together  "  by  covenant."  I  do  not  say  that  they 
were  not  associated  "  in  faith  and  fellowship,"  as 
well  as  in  communities,  and  labors,  and  sufferings, 
and  forms  of  worship,  and  other  things.  But 
that  they  were  associated  by  covenant  in  any  of 
these  things,  is  an  idea  not  only  totally  foreign 
from  the  true  meaning  of  the  Greek  word  IxxX^tfia, 
but  contrary  to  the  genius  and  history  of  apostolic 
Christianity.  Your  definition  of  a  church  of  God, 
therefore,  I  cannot  but  consider  as  altogether  gra- 
tuitous, unsupported  by  a  correct  view  of  the 
churches  of  the  New  Testament,  and,  as  a  scrip- 

*  Gal.  ii.  9. 

f  Christian  Review,  vol.  i.  p.  525. 

\  See  Rom.  xvi.  16. 


22  OPEN    COMMUNION. 

tural  definition,  contradictory  to  the  testimony  of 
inspiration. 

Let  us  now  inquire  whether  the  expression, 
"  the  church,"  is  ever  used  in  the  New  Testament 
to  denote  the  visible  body  of  Christians  among 
men. 

It  is  evident  that  when  used  unqualifiedly,  as 
in  Eph.  iii.  21,  "Unto  him  be  glory  in  the 
church  by  Jesus  Christ  throughout  all  ages,"  it 
cannot  denote  a  particular  church.  An  individual 
band  of  Christians  is  never  called  the  church, 
unless  there  are  some  qualifying  words  connected 
with  the  expression, — as  in  the  phrases,  "  the 
church  of  the  Thessalonians"  "the  church  which 
was  at  Antioch"  and  so  on, — or  unless  there  is 
something  in  the  context  showing  that  a  parti- 
cular church  is  referred  to,  or  something  requiring 
the  word  to  be  understood  as  having  such  a  re- 
ference, as  in  Acts  xx.  17,  "From  Miletus  Paul 
sent  to  Ephesus,  and  called  for  the  elders  of  the 
church,"  that  is,  of  the  church  of  Ephesus,  "  the 
flock  over  which  the  Holy  Ghost  had  made  them 
overseers,"  as  it  is  said  a  few  verses  after.  But 
when  the  word  is  found  without  any  qualifications 
whatever,  either  expressed  or  implied,  its  only 
other  scriptural  use  is  not,  as  you  say,  to  denote 
the  body  of  true  believers  in  the  world,  the  church 
invisible.     But,  as  the   church  at  the  house  of 


ON    THE    WORD    CHURCH.  23 

Aquila  denoted  the  body  of  Christians  at  his 
house,  and  as  the  church  of  Ephesus  denoted  the 
body  of  Christians  at  Ephesus,  including  both  the 
members  of  the  church  at  the  house  of  Aquila 
and  all  other  Christians  in  that  city,  so,  by  a  still 
more  extended  application  of  the  term,  the  un- 
qualified expression,  "  the  church,"  denotes,  not 
unfrequently,  the  body  of  professing  Christians 
throughout  the  world  embracing  all  acknowledged 
visible  disciples  of  Christ. 

The  phrase,  "  the  household  of  faith,"  is  evi- 
dently used  in  this  sense.  "  As  we  have  oppor- 
tunity," says  Paul,  "  let  us  do  good  unto  all  men, 
especially  unto  them  who  are  of  the  household  of 
faith  ."*  His  especial  reference  is  not  to  true  be- 
lievers as  believers,  but  to  such  as  are  of  the  house- 
hold of  believers,  the  Christian  church.  And  so 
church  is  repeatedly  used.     For  example : 

Acts  ii.  47.  "  The  Lord  added  to  the  church 
daily  such  as  should  be  saved  ;"  that  is,  to  the 
Christian  body,  by  bringing  men  to  repentance 
and  faith ;  these  inward  acts  being  immediately 
followed  by  the  outward  one  of  confessing  him 
and  professing  discipleship  to  him.  The  ad- 
dition here  spoken  of  was  unquestionably  made 
in  Jerusalem.   But  this  does  not  necessarily  imply 

*  GaL  vi.  10. 


24  OPEN    COMMUNION. 

that  it  was  the  increase  of  the  band  of  Christians 
in  Jerusalem  as  such,  that  is  here  designed  to  be 
noticed.  On  the  contrary,  the  tenor  of  the  record 
forbids  such  an  interpretation.  The  thing  spoken 
of  is  the  increase  of  the  Christian  community, 
the  enlargement  and  strengthening  of  the  cause 
of  Christ,  some  of  whose  adherents  were  collected 
at  Jerusalem,  while  the  rest  were  scattered  about 
in  different  parts  of  the  country,  as  appears  from 
the  fact  that  the  Saviour,  after  his  resurrection, 
"  was  seen  of  above  five  hundred  brethren  at 
once,"  while  on  the  day  of  Pentecost  the  number 
of  the  names  assembled  together  at  Jerusalem, 
was  only  "  about  a  hundred  and  twenty."*  In 
this  view  I  am  far  from  being  alone.  To  say 
nothing  of  others,  Prof.  Ripley,  who  like  yourself 
defends  restricted  communion,  in  his  Notes  on  the 
Acts,  speaks  of  the  addition  of  the  three  thousand, 
mentioned  a  verse  or  two  previous,  as  "an  ac- 
cession to  the  Christian  company,"  of  which  he 
had,  just  before  this,  taken  occasion  to  show,  only 
a  portion  were  at  Jerusalem. 

Again,  1  Cor.  xii.  28.  "God  hath  set  some 
in  the  church,  first  apostles,  secondarily  prophets," 
&c. ;  that  is,  in  the  Christian  body,  distinguished 
as  a  community  from  the  world.     But  you  say, 

*  1  Cor.  xv.  6.     Acts  i.  15. 


ON   THE    WORD    CHURCH.  25 

"No:  church  is  here  a  generic  word,  compre- 
hending all  the  visible  churches  as  churches." 
True,  it  is  a  generic  word  ;  but  it  is  always  used  to 
denote  a  number  of  individuals,  more  or  less.  It 
is  never,  either  here  or  elsewhere,  used  to  denote 
several  churches  collectively,  any  more  than  the 
word  flock  is  ever  used  to  signify  a  number  of 
flocks  taken  together.  Such  a  use  of  the  word 
is,  as  Neander  very  justly  observes, "  quite  contrary 
to  the  phraseology  of  the  apostolic  age."*  It 
denotes  here,  obviously,  as  in  the  preceding  in- 
stance, the  body  of  professing  Christians  in  the 
world.  And  so  says  Prof.  J.  T.  Smith.  In  his 
"New  Testament  and  Historical  Arguments  for 
Infant  Baptism  Examined,"  he  remarks,  in  com- 
menting on  the  meaning  of  the  "  one  body  "  in 
1  Cor.  xii,  13,  that  "the  'one  body'  is  the  visible 
church  ;  and  that  the  visible  church  is  referred  to 
by  the  phrase,  is  evident  from  the  whole  connexion. 
'  Now  are  ye  the  body  of  Christ  and  members  in 
particular.  And  God  hath  set  some  in  the  church, 
first  apostles,  <fcc.'"  Now  whatever  is  apparent 
from  this  comment,  nothing  is  more  so  than  that 
by  "  the  church  "  in  this  verse,  Prof.  S.  understands 
the  apostle,  as  I  do,  to  mean  "  the  visible  church," 
the  body  of  Christ's  disciples. 

*  Planting  and  Training,  <fec,  Ryland's  Trans,  p.  92. 
3 


26  OPEN    COMMUNION. 

Once  more.  1  Cor.  xv.  9.  "lam  not  meet  to 
be  called  an  apostle,  because  I  persecuted  the 
church  of  God."  Gal.  i.  13.  "Beyond  measure 
I  persecuted  tlie  church  of  God  and  wasted  it." 
Phil.  iii.  6.  "If  any  other  man  thinketh  he  hath 
whereof  he  might  trust  in  the  flesh,  I  more  .... 
concerning  zeal,  persecuting  the  church."  Not 
the  church  invisible  certainly.  The  persecuting 
Saul  little  cared  whether  the  objects  of  his  malice 
were  anything  more  than  "  disciples  of  the  Lord," 
like  Ananias  and  Sapphira,  in  profession  and  ap- 
pearance only.  Nor  was  it  members  of  the 
church  at  Jerusalem  as  such  tftat  he  persecuted, 
but  any  and  all  who  were  identified  with  Christ 
by  a  profession  of  his  name,  wherever  he  found 
them.  And  so  Prof.  Ripley  regards  it ;  for  in  his 
Review  of  Dr.  Griffin's  Letter  on  Communion,  he 
designates  Saul  of  Tarsus  as  a  "  persecutor  of  the 
church"  without  qualifying  the  expression  at  all, 
as  he  would  have  done  had  his  idea  been  that  it 
was  some  particular  church  of  which  he  was  a 
persecutor.  It  was  against  the  sect  of  the  Naza- 
renes  as  such,  that  the  young  man  breathed  out 
threatenings  and  slaughter.  His  own  confession 
afterwards  before  the  Roman  tribune,  Claudius 
Lysias,  was,  "I  persecuted  this  way  unto  the 
death  ;"*  that  is,  I  persecuted  to  death  those  of  this 
*  Acts  xxii.  4. 


ON    THE    WORD    CHURCH.  27 

persuasion — the  professors  of  this  religion.  And 
his  language  before  Lysias  is  the  same  in  meaning 
as  when  he  says  to  the  Corinthians  and  Galatians, 
"I  persecuted  the  church."  That  the  object  of 
his  persecution  was  not  the  church  in  Jerusalem 
as  such,  is  farther  evident  from  the  fact  of  which 
he  himself  informs  us,  that  among  other  churches 
in  Judea  it  could  be  said,  and  was  said,  upon  their 
hearing  of  his  conversion,  "He  that  persecuted 
us  in  times  past,  now  preacheth  the  faith  he  once 
destroyed."* 

Even  Mr.  Curtis,  who  professes  to  take  the  same 
view  that  you  do,  admits  that  the  word  may  some- 
times be  used  thus  in  the  Scriptures.  And  I  pre- 
sume the  denomination  agree  with  him  in  this, 
since  his  work  is  published  by  the  American 
Baptist  Publication  Society,  and  has  been  endorsed 
by  the  Christian  Review  and  Baptist  journals 
generally,  as  sound  and  scriptural.  His  language 
is  this :  "  There  may  be  a  figurative  use  of  the 
word  church  in  two  or  three  passages  of  the  New 
Testament,  without  all  the  ideas  of  a  regular 
organization  being  involved.  In  some  points  of 
view,  unquestionably,  those  who  make  a  credible 
profession  of  the  Christian  faith,  must  be  regarded 
as  a  whole.  They  are  a  body  distinct  from  the 
world,  but  operating  upon  it  with  a  certain  degree 
*  Gal.  I  22,  23. 


28  OPEN    COMMUNION. 

of  uniformity  and  power.  This  body  is  distinct 
from  the  invisible  church  universal,  in  that  all  who 
are  professors  of  religion,  and  some,  therefore,  who 
are  only  professors,  are  mixed  up  with  true  Christians 
in  the  present  world.  It  is  distinct  from  any  parti- 
cular visible  church,  since  it  embraces  members  of  all 
truly  Christian  churches  throughout  the  world. 
Such  a  body  as  this,  however,  he  concludes,'4  cannot, 
in  any  other  than  a  merely  figurative  sense, be  called 
a  church."*  But  whether  it  can  be  called  thus  with- 
out a  figure  or  not,  is  nothing  to  the  purpose,  nor 
does  it  affect  the  question  under  consideration  in 
the  least.  With  as  much  propriety  might  it  be 
said  that  the  phrase,  "  the  body  of  Christ,"  can- 
not denote  the  church  except  figuratively.  And 
yet  the  apostle  uses  it  in  this  sense  repeatedly. 
The  simple  question  is,  figurative  or  not,  is  the 
word  ever  used  at  all  in  the  Scriptures  as  a  desig- 
nation for  "  all  credible  professors  of  Christianity  ?" 
Prof.  Curtis  admits  it  is,  and  that,  as  such,  "it 
embraces  members  of  all  truly  Christian  churches 
throughout  the  world."  If  you  cannot  agree  with 
him,  to  say  nothing  of  others,  you  have  the  most 
intelligent  of  our  denomination  opposed  to  you. 
And  if  you  can,  then  you  admit  all  that  I  am 
contending  for.  This,  however,  is  not  a  figurative 
use  of  the  word  any  more  than  in  the  expression 
*  On  Communion  p.  284. 


ON    THE    WORD    CHURCH.  29 

"the  church  which  was  at  Jerusalem."  In  sup- 
posing that  "  all  the  ideas  of  a  regular  organiza- 
tion are  involved"  in  a  literal  use  of  the  word, 
Prof.  Curtis  has  in  his  mind's  eye  the  common  idea 
of  a  church,  not  the  literal  import  of  the  Greek  word 
hxky)(fioL  which,  as  you  cannot  but  see,  denotes 
neither  directly  nor  indirectly  an  organization,  but 
simply  a  collection  of  individuals.  The  place 
within  which  they  are  collected  may  be  a  house, 
a  city,  or  a  world. 

But  I  need  not  dwell  longer  on  this  point.  The 
word  is  understood  and  continually  used  thus  by 
all  classes  of  Christians,  and  by  Baptists  no  less 
than  by  others,  as  a  reference  to  their  writings  will 
easily  show.  And  I  think  you  must  yourself  be 
prepared  to  agree  with  me  that  your  position  re- 
specting the  word  is  a  foregone  conclusion  and 
untenable. 

Now  as  to  the  nature  of  the  body  denoted  by 
the  word.  It  was  designed  to  be  a  visible  repre- 
sentation, so  far  as  it  should  go,  of  the  church 
invisible,  or  body  of  true  saints  among  men.  This 
is  evident  from  its  being  called  a  household  of 
faith,  as  well  as  from  the  fact  that  none  but  those 
who  really  exercise  faith  in  Christ  can  be  proper 
individuals  for  professing  faith  in  him  and  being 
numbered  among  his  disciples.  So  that,  if  the 
Christian  church  were  what  it  was  designed  to  be, 
3* 


30  OPEN    COMMUNION. 

it  would  be  a  representation  of  the  church  invi- 
sible. 

And  such  being  the  case,  an  entrance  into  it  is 
obtained  by  an  avowal  on  the  part  of  the  candi- 
date, and  an  acknowledgment  on  the  part  of 
others,  of  his  membership  in  the  church  invisible  ; 
or,  as  we  commonly  say,  by  the  making  of  a  pro- 
fession of  Christianity.  With  some,  however,  it  is 
a  favorite  idea  that  baptism  is  the  door  of  entrance 
into  the  Christian  church.  But  this  is  overlooking 
entirely  the  fact  that  the  church  is  designed  to 
represent  the  body  of  believers  in  the  world. 
Those  whom  the  Scriptures  recognise  as  its  mem- 
bers are  the  professed  people  of  God.  The  act 
which  introduces  them  into  this  number  is  obvi- 
ously the  making  of  a  profession  of  Christianity. 
Baptism  may  be  the  accompaniment  of  that  act, 
and  I  believe,  as  firmly  as  you,  that  it  should 
always  be.  But  still  it  is  only  an  accompaniment ; 
and,  if  wanting,  does  not  necessarily  invalidate 
one's  profession,  or  prove  that  he  is  not  a  member 
of  the  Christian  body.  When  duly  administered, 
it  is  at  most  only  a  token  of  something  else ;  and 
this  something  else  is  the  renunciation  of  the  world 
and  entering  upon  discipleship  to  Christ.  If  bap- 
tism, as  such,  were  the  entrance  door  into  the 
Christian  church,  then  not  merely  would  all  who 
have  been  baptized  be  members,  if  they  had  not 


ON   THE    WORD    CHURCH.  31 

been  excommunicated,  but  none  would  be  mem- 
bers but  such  ;  however  long,  or  zealously,  or  cre- 
dibly they  may  have  served  Christ  and  passed 
among  men  as  his  disciples.  But  if  this  were  the 
case,  the  Christian  church  would  not  be  the  body 
of  professing  Christians  in  the  world,  which  I  have 
just  shown  it  is.  The  real  door  into  it,  therefore, 
is  the  making  of  a  profession  of  Christianity,  let 
the  form  in  which  that  profession  is  made  be  what 
it  may.  Whoever  has  passed  through  this  door 
and  maintains  a  consistent  Christian  character,  I 
care  not  who  he  is,  is  in  the  visible  church  of 
Christ. 

It  follows  from  this,  then,  that  every  credible 
evangelical  Pedobaptist  is  a  member  no  less  than 
his  Baptist  brother  who,  so  far  as  conformity  to 
apostolic  forms  is  concerned,  has  doubtless  the 
advantage  over  him.  There  is  no  half-way  ground 
that  we  can  take.  If  Pedobaptists  are  not  in  the 
church  of  Christ  where  are  they  ?  In  the  world  ? 
Among  non-professors  ?  No  part  of  the  house- 
hold of  faith  ?  You  cannot  admit  this.  But  the 
Scriptures  recognise  no  midway  position  between 
the  church  and  the  world;  nor  can  we.  We 
must,  therefore,  either  unchurch  them  altogether, 
which  no  one  worthy  of  the  Christian  name  can 
do,  or  we  must  admit  them  fully  and  unqualifiedly 
to  be  a  part  of  the  visible  church  of  God.     If  the 


32  OPEN    COMMUNION. 

church  were  a  household  of  the  baptized,  the  case 
would  be  different.  But  as  it  is,  it  is  a  household 
of  faith.  So  long  as  the  only  known  form  of 
making  an  honest  Christian  profession  was  by  im- 
mersion, of  course  one  could  not  be  a  member  of 
the  Christian  body  without  immersion.  But  as 
that  is  not  the  case  now,  there  is  no  shadow  of  a 
reason  for  regarding  the  visible  church  of  Christ 
as  embracing  only  the  Baptist  denomination.  Nay, 
so  long  as  it  is  a  stubborn  fact  that  multitudes  of 
holy  and  zealous  Christians  differ  from  us  in 
their  views  of  the  act  and  subjects  of  baptism,  and 
on  this  account  are  unimmersed,  it  is  most  unjust 
and  unchristian  in  us,  by  our  actions,  to  declare 
that  they  are  not  in  the  church  of  God,  especially 
when  it  is  admitted  that  their  only  failing  is  in 
confessing  Christ  before  men  in  a  manner  different, 
as  we  believe,  from  that  the  Saviour  intended, 
while  they  have  the  spirit  of  obedience  and  love 
for  him  which  he  requires,  and  which  would  lead 
them  to  do  precisely  in  this  thing  as  we  do,  did 
they  but  believe  as  we  do. 

A  word,  in  conclusion,  about  baptizing  into  the 
fellowship  of  a  particular  church.  "We  often  hear 
the  expression,  but  it  is  an  unauthorized  use  of 
words,  and  tends  to  convey,  if  not  to  establish,  a 
wrong  impression  of  the  true  object  of  baptism. 
Such  bodies  as  we  call  churches  did  not  exist  in 


ON    THE    WORD    CHURCH.  33 

the  apostles'  days;  and,  of  course,  there  was  then 
no  baptizing  into  the  fellowship  of  such  bodies. 
Besides,  you  will  agree  with  me  that  baptism  is  a 
symbol  of  union  professed  to  the  crucified,  buried, 
and  risen  Saviour,  to  be  received  upon  an  indi- 
vidual's entering  upon  a  life  of  union  to  him  and 
his  people.  As,  therefore,  upon  receiving  this 
ordinance,  a  person  is  baptized  into  Christ ;  he  is 
also  baptized  into  the  fellowship  of  them  that  are 
Christ's,  that  is,  the  Christian  body,  not  into  the 
fellowship  of  any  one  particular  church  more  than 
another.  As  Andrew  Fuller  very  justly  observes, 
"  The  nature  and  design  of  baptism,  as  given  in 
the  New  Testament,  shows  it  to  have  been  the 
initiatory  ordinance  of  Christianity.  It  was  not 
an  initiation  into  a  particular  church,  seeing  it  was 
administered,  in  some  cases,  as  that  of  the  Ethio- 
pian eunuch,  in  which  there  was  no  opportunity 
of  joining  any ;  but  it  was  an  initiation  into  the 
body  of  professing  Christians."*  There  is  no  such 
thing  recognised  in  the  New  Testament  as  bap- 
tizing into  the  fellowship  of  a  particular  church. 
When  an  individual  received  the  ordinance  in 
those  days,  he  was  thereby  received  into  the  fel- 
lowship of  the  visible  church  of  God ;  and,  with- 
out any  farther  ceremony,  he  was  a  member  not 

*  Works,  vol.  iii.  p.  512. 


34  OPEN    COMMUNION. 

merely  of  the  band  of  Christians  where  he  was 
baptized,  if  there  was  any  such  band  there,  but  of 
any  other  among  whom  his  lot  might  be  cast. 
Wherever  he  met,  as  an  acknowledged  disciple  of 
Christ,  with  other  disciples,  his  meeting  with  them 
thus  made  him  a  member  of  their  church  or  Chris- 
tian circle.  The  employment,  therefore,  of  this 
ordinance  as  a  symbol  of  admittance  into  particular 
churches  is  unjustifiable ;  and  to  speak,  as  many 
do,  of  baptizing  into  the  fellowship  of  such  bodies, 
is,  of  course,  incorrect. 

Thus  much  have  I  thought  it  necessary  to  say 
respecting  your  position  on  the  word  church,  in 
order  that  we  might  clearly  see  what  weight  there 
is  in  your  reasoning  about  "  the  church  as  Christ 
constituted  it,"  and  about  "  preserving  its  consti- 
tution in  its  original  form."  From  the  foregoing 
considerations,  it  is  evident  these  expressions  are 
unmeaning,  so  far  as  they  relate  to  churches  as 
organizations,  and  to  the  church  as  a  body  of 
baptized  ones,  instead  of  a  body  of  professing 
Christians.  We  preserve  the  constitution  of  the 
church  in  its  original  form,  by  regarding,  as  was 
done  in  the  apostles'  days,  all  acknowledged  profess- 
ing Christians,  and  only  such,  as  its  members.  And 
we  "  keep  the  ordinances  as  they  have  been  deli- 
vered to  us,"  by  administering  them  to  scriptural 
subjects,  in  a  scriptural  manner,  and  for  scriptural 


ON    THE    WORD    CHURCH.  35 

purposes — baptism,  to  those  entering  upon  visi- 
ble discipleship  to  Christ,  to  denote  their  profes- 
sion of  union,  and  pledge  of  allegiance,  to  him 
their  crucified,  buried,  and  risen  Lord ;  and  the 
supper,  to  such  as  are  his  visible  disciples,  repro- 
fessing  their  union,  and  repledging  their  allegiance, 
to  him.  On  the  former  of  these  points,  we  are 
agreed ;  on  the  latter,  we  differ.  The  object  of 
my  future  letters  will  be  to  show  that  our  differ- 
ence here  is  uncalled  for. 

Yours  in  all  sincerity,  &c. 


LETTER  II. 

THE    POINT    OF    DIFFERENCE    BETWEEN    OPEN    AND 
CLOSE    COMMUNIONISTS. 

Not  respecting  the  terms  of  membership  in  Baptist 
churches — Not  respecting  the  propriety  of  communing 
with  non-professors — Not  respecting  the  order  of 
administering  the  ordinances  to  new  converts — Not 
whether  Baptists  are  as  free  as  others  or  not — But 
whether  it  is  proper  for  them  to  commune  at  the 
Lord's  table  with  unimraersed  members  of  the  Chris- 
tian church. 

Mr  Dear  Friend  : — In  my  former  letter  I  took 
occasion  to  animadvert  upon  your  views  of  the 
word  church.  Before  proceeding  any  farther,  let 
us  understand  precisely  what  the  point  of  differ- 
ence between  us  on  this  communion  question  is. 

It  is  not  respecting  the  terms  of  membership  in 
particular  churches,  that  we  differ.  I  agree  with 
you  fully  in  your  quotations  from  Mr.  Curtis,  that 
"  the  true  and  proper  way  is  for  Christians  to  form 
themselves  into  churches  with  those  with  whom 
they  agree  in  practice  and  opinion.  Let  those  who 
hold  to  believers'  baptism  join  churches  which 
practise    thus,    and    those    who    conscientiously 


OPEN    AND    CLOSE    COMMUNIONISTS.  37 

believe  in  infant  baptism,  and  are  prepared  to 
practise  it,  join  churches  composed  of  those  whose 
views  are  similar."  The  question  of  individual- 
church  membership  is  one  of  expediency  entirely. 
And  I  see  no  necessity,  under  ordinary  circum- 
stances, for  commingling  Baptists  and  Pedobap- 
tists  together  in  the  membership  of  the  same 
church. 

But  do  you  say,  that  it  would  be  preposterous 
to  commune  with  a  man,  and  then  not  permit 
him  to  vote  in  ordinary  matters  relative  to  the 
order  and  instruction  of  the  congregation  ?  Do 
you  ask  whether  this  would  not  be  admitting  him 
to  the  greater  privilege  and  denying  him  the  Jess  ? 
Your  objecting  proceeds  upon  the  idea  that  the 
Lord's  supper  is  an  individual-church  privilege,  or 
a  privilege  that  we  may  extend  to,  or  withhold 
from,  whom  we  please,  which  is  not  the  case.  The 
privilege  of  membership  in  churches  with  us,  how- 
ever, is  of  this  character.  That  is  to  say,  our 
churches  are  not  divinely  organized  societies ;  nor, 
for  entering  them  as  organizations,  are  there  any 
divinely  prescribed  terms  or  forms.  So  that,  so  far 
as  admission  to  membership  in  them  is  concerned, 
we  are,  of  course,  left  to  act  in  such  a  way  as  shall 
be  most  obviously  for  the  welfare  of  individual 
churches  in  particular,  and  the  Redeemer's  king- 
dom in  general. 

4 


38  OPEN    COMMUNION. 

Yau  perceive,  therefore,  that  the  question 
respecting  the  terms  of  membership  in  churches 
with  us,  is  not  only  one  of  expediency,  but  wholly 
foreign  from  that  respecting  the  terms  of  sacra- 
mental communion  as  such.  Consequently,  all 
reasoning  about  the  organization  of  visible 
churches  and  the  terms  of  membership  therein, 
when  employed  in  defence  of  restricted  commu- 
nion, is  to  no  purpose.  There  is  no  such  thing  as 
the  unlawfulness  of  mixed  membership.  But 
respecting  its  undesirableness,  we  are  agreed. 
This  is  not  the  point  of  difference  between  us. 

Nor  is  it,  whether  we  may  commune  with  any 
who  are  unimmersed,  irrespective  of  the  consider- 
ation whether  they  are  professors  of  Christianity 
or  not.  With  non-professors,  even  though  they 
may  be  believers,  the  communion  question  has 
nothing  to  do.  It  relates  only  to  the  propriety  of 
communing  with  acknowledged  professing  Chris- 
tians who  are  unimmersed,  that  is,  with  Pedobap- 
tists.  That  they  are  professing  Christians  and  a 
part  of  the  household  of  faith,  you  admit.  And 
so  do  Baptists  universally,  in  whose  behalf  Prof. 
Curtis  employs  these  words  :  "  It  has  frequently 
been  urged  that,  by  our  course,  we  at  least 
unchurch  all  other  denominations.  But  this  is  a 
complete  error.  We  do  not  unchurch  them.  We 
will  not  deny  the  claims  of  any  body  of  evange- 


OPEN    AND    CL08E    COMMUNIONISTS.  39 

lical  Christians,  organized  for  maintaining  social 
worship,  to  be  considered  a  Christian  church."* 
Indeed,  the  charge  of  placing  the  members  of 
other  denominations  outside  the  pale  of  the  Chris- 
tian church  is  one  which  pious  Baptists,  you 
know,  have  always  repelled.  Restricted  commu- 
nion is  not  pleaded  for  on  the  ground  that  they 
are  non-professors,  and  a  part  of  the  world  for 
whom  the  supper  was  not  designed.  Nor  are  open 
communionists  charged  with  desiring  to  make  the 
table  of  the  Lord  free  to  the  world,  as  well  as  the 
church.  Such  a  charge  would  be  crushed  under 
the  weight  of  its  own  truthlessness ;  for  we  agree 
with  you  that  the  non-professing  world  have  no 
right  to  the  Lord's  supper.  The  point  of  differ- 
ence between  us  is  not  respecting  the  admission  to 
the  Lord's  table  of  non-professors,  whether  unim- 
mersed  or  immersed. 

Nor  is  it  about  the  order  of  administering  the 
ordinances  to  them.  You  greatly  mistake  when  you 
suppose  the  whole  difference  between  us  lies  in  the 
question  whether  the  several  duties  commanded  in 
the  apostolic  commission  are  to  be  observed  in  the 
order  in  which  they  are  enjoined  by  Christ,  or 
whether  they  are  left  to  be  regulated  by  the  con- 
venience or  inclination  of  his  disciples.  So  far  from 

*  On  Com.  pp.  144,  190,  264,  280.  See  also  Christian 
Review,  vol.  xiv.,  pp.  224,  225,  which  sustains  Mr.  C.  in 
these  declarations. 


40  OPEN    COMMUNION. 

this  being  the  whole  inquiry,  there  is  no  difference 
between  us  here.  Open  communion  Baptists  do 
not  defend  the  latter  of  these  conclusions,  as  you 
say  they  do ; — a  statement  which,  I  confess,  I  am 
surprised  at  your  making,  for  Robert  Hall,  whose 
writings  on  this  subject  you  profess  to  have  read 
with  care,  says,  very  plainly :  "  When  the  advo- 
cates of  strict  communion  remind  us  of  the  order 
in  which  the  two  positive  institutions  of  Christian- 
ity are  enjoined,  they  assume  it  for  granted  that 
we  are  desirous  of  inverting  that  order,  and  that 
we  are  contending  for  a  celebration  of  the  eucha- 
rist  previous  to  baptism  in  the  case  of  a  clear  com- 
prehension of  the  nature  and  obligation  of  each. 
We  plead  for  nothing  of  the  kind.  Suppose  a 
convert  to  Christianity  convinced  of  the  ordinance 
of  baptism  in  the  light  in  which  we  contemplate 
it,  we  should  urge  his  obligation  to  comply  with 
it  previous  to  his  reception  of  the  sacrament,  with 
as  little  hesitation  as  the  most  rigid  of  our  oppo- 
nents ;  nor  should  we  be  more  disposed  than 
themselves  to  countenance  a  neglect  of  known 
duty  or  a  wanton  inversion  of  the  order  of  Chris- 
tian appointments.  Whether,  in  such  circumstan- 
ces, the  attention  of  a  subject  for  Christian  com- 
munion should  first  be  directed  to  baptism,  is  not 
the  question  at  issue."*     No  one  denies  that,  so 

*  Works,  vol.  i.  pp.  305,  306. 


OPEN    AND    CLOSE    COMMUNIONISTS.  41 

far  as  non-professors  are  concerned,  the  order  to  be 
observed  by  us  in  administering  the  ordinances  is, 
baptism  before  the  supper ;  not,  however,  as  a 
prerequisite  to  communion,  but  as  the  appointed 
form  of  making  a  profession  of  Christianity,  which 
profession  is  necessary  to  one's  being  a  visible  dis- 
ciple or  in  the  visible  church,  which  one  must 
needs  be,  in  order  to  come  to  a  table  spread  only 
for  those  who  are  visibly  Christ's.  All  the  reason- 
ing, therefore,  that  is  expended  in  proving  this  to 
be  the  designed  order,  is  wholly  uncalled  for.  No 
one  questions  it ;  at  least  open  communionists  do 
not.  And  to  advance  reasons  in  support  of  this 
order,  as  though  it  were  arguing  in  defence  of 
restricted  communion,  is  an  evasion  of  the  whole 
question.  It  betrays,  too,  an  oversight  of  the  end 
for  which,  and  the  individuals  for  whom,  the  ordi- 
nances were  intended.  What  would  be  thought 
of  one  who  should  have  been  heard,  in  the  apos- 
tles' days,  contending  for  the  order  of  adminis- 
tering the  ordinances  to  those  who  were  acknow- 
ledged to  be  in  the  Christian  church,  but  who, 
like  the  eleven  and  others,  had  not  entered  by 
immersion  ?  Would  he  not  be  set  down  as  a 
person  who  did  not  understand  what  he  was  talk- 
ing about?  one  who  was  either  ignorant  of,  or 
who  had  entirely  lost  sight  of,  the  object  of,  at 
least,  one  of  the  ordinances,  or  for  whom  it  was 
4* 


42 


OPEN    COMMUNION. 


intended  ?  Most  assuredly.  This,  however,  is 
just  the  position  in  which  you  place  yourself  by 
admitting  Pedobaptists  to  be  in  the  household  of 
faith,  or,  which  is  the  same  thing,  saying  that  you 
do  not  unchurch  them,  while  at  the  same  time 
you  talk  of  the  order  of  administering  the  ordi- 
nances to  them.  A  member  of  the  visible  church 
of  Christ  is  not  a  scriptural  subject  for  baptism. 
And  as  to  the  order  of  administering  the  sacra- 
ments to  non-professors,  there  is  no  difference 
between  us.     This  is  not  the  question  before  us. 

Nor  is  it,  whether  we  are  as  free  or  not  in  our 
communion  as  others  are.  Some,  indeed,  like  Mr. 
Remington,  seem  to  think  this  is  the  whole  ques- 
tion. Instead  of  justifying  the  practice  of  restric- 
tion by  the  principles  of  the  Word  of  God  and  the 
practice  of  the  primitive  disciples,  they  seek  to 
defend  it  on  the  ground  that  "Pedobaptists  are 
not  open  communionists."  Even  if  it  were  true 
that  Baptists  were  more  free  and  liberal  in  their 
administrations  Of  the  Lord's  supper  than  other 
denominations — which,  however,  is  about  as  capa- 
ble of  being  proved  as  that  a  barred  and  bolted 
house  is  easier  of  access  than  one  with  open  doors 
whose  inmates  stand  to  welcome  you  in — what 
would  this  have  to  do  with  justifying  the  practice 
of  close  communion  ?  The  question  is  not,  Are 
we  as  free  as  others  ?  but,  Are  we  as  free  as  God's 


OPEN    AND    CLOSE    COMMUNIONISTS.  43 

Word  and  the  genius  of  the  ennobling  religion  of 
Christ  require  us  to  be  ? — a  religion  which,  instead 
of  possessing  one  retaliative  or  exclusive  feature, 
seeketh  not  her  own,  but  hopeth  all  things,  and 
draws  together  and  binds  together  in  Christ  cruci- 
fied, at  all  times  and  under  all  circumstances,  the 
membership  of  the  common  household  of  faith. 
Will  the  errors  and  malpractices  of  others,  imagi- 
nary or  real,  justify  us  in  pursuing  a  course  that 
is  opposed  to  the  Scriptures,  to  apostolic  precedent, 
to  the  dignity  of  the  religion  of  the  Son  of  God, 
and  to  the  principles  of  that  liberty  wherewith 
Christ  makes  free  ?  But,  alas  !  the  best  of  men 
are  but  men,  and  more  or  less  prone  to  follow 
men  instead  of  Christ !  It  is  truly  lamentable  to 
see  men  of  piety  and  usefulness,  men  who  are 
lights  in  the  world,  ornaments  in  the  church  of 
God,  and  as  Christians  admired  of  all,  so  far  los- 
ing sight  of  the  principles  on  which  alone  truth 
can  be  defended  as  to  seek  to  justify  themselves 
by  appealing,  in  support  of  their  views,  to  the 
unhallowed  feelings  of  depraved  humanity.  It  is 
a  weak  cause  indeed  that  is  sustained  by  such  a 
course,  and  a  bad  one  alone  that  needs  it.  And 
yet  this  is  the  mode,  as  you  very  well  know,  in 
which  hundreds  are  made  confirmed  restricted 
communionists.  When  all  other  arguments  fail, 
this,  in  nine  cases  out  of  ten,  is  sure  to  be  plied, 


44  OPEN    COMMUNION. 

if  not  to  effect  the  end  desired.  The  question  of 
truth  and  duty  is  lost  sight  of,  while  the  differences 
and  disaffections  existing  from  time  to  time  among 
the  members  of  other  denominations  and  their 
want  of  fellowship  for  restricted  communionists, 
are  pointed  to,  and  from  these  an  argument  is 
drawn,  appealing,  unconsciously  it  may  be,  but 
none  the  less  strongly,  to  the  selfish  feelings,  and 
awakening,  in  the  bosoms  of  such  as  are  influenced 
thereby,  anything  but  the  spirit  of  Christ. 

I  shall  not,  however,  attempt  to  defend  the 
claims  of  free  communion  by  any  such  mode  of 
warfare  as  this.  With  those  who  profess  to  take 
their  fellow  men  as  their  standard  of  duty,  and  to 
make  their  actions  the  rule  of  Christian  conduct, 
I  have  nothing  to  do.  It  is  by  the  Word  of  God 
alone  that  I  would  have  the  propriety  of  restricted 
communion  tested.  If  it  is  right,  it  can  be 
sustained  by  scriptural  arguments,  without 
recourse  to  self-justitications  founded  on  the  mal- 
practices of  others.  And  not  only  so,  but  it  is 
absolutely  impolitic  to  urge  in  its  defence  the 
errors  of  others,  whether  real  or  imaginary.  This 
is  a  course  calculated  at  once  to  awaken  suspicion, 
and  to  lead  a  mind  imbued  with  the  spirit  of 
Christ  strongly  to  question  the  propriety  of  the 
practice,  even  if  it  were  lawful. 

But  to   return,  and   to   conclude.     The   only 


OPEN    AND    CLOSE    COMMUNIONISTS.  45 

question  between  us  is,  What  are  the  terms  upon 
which  alone  the  Lord's  table  can  be  approached? 
Are  they  really,  as  you  say,  repentance,  faith,  and 
a  profession  of  discipleship  to  Christ  by  immer- 
sion ?  Is  the  want  of  an  immersional  profession, 
on  the  part  of  a  disciple  whose  acknowledged 
visible  discipleship  of  five,  twenty-five,  or  fifty 
years,  more  or  less,  was  entered  upon  without  it, 
but  under  circumstances  which  argue  nothing 
whatever  against  his  Christian  character,  a 
divinely  recognised  disqualification  for  his  uniting 
•with  us  in  commemorating  his  master's  death  ? 
Is  not  the  injunction,  "  This  do  in  remembrance 
of  me,"  given  to  any  but  Baptists  ?  Can  the 
Lord's  supper  be  lawfully  observed  by  none  but 
them  ?  Are  we  forbidden  fi^pm  communing  with 
persons  out  of  our  own  denomination  ?  Or  in  one 
word,  have  we  no  right  to  commune  with  unim- 
mersed  members  of  the  Christian  church  ?  This 
you  will  perceive  is  the  whole  inquiry,  for  the 
point  of  difference  between  us  is,  respecting  the 
propriety  of  our  communing  with  members  of 
other  churches  on  the  score  of  their  not  being 
qualified  for  commemorating  the  death  of  Christ. 
Obvious  as  the  answer  to  these  questions  may 
seem,  let  us,  nevertheless,  to  the  law  and  to  the 
testimony,  and  abide  by  their  decisions.  As  Mr. 
Taylor   says,    "In  a  question    of  so   much   im- 


46  OPEN    COMMUNION. 

portance,  no  considerations  of  policy  should 
influence  us  without  the  clearest  evidence  of 
scriptural  precedent.  Whatever  may  become  of 
denominational  preferences,  let  the  dictation  of 
the  King  of  Zion  and  the  example  of  the  apostolic 
churches,  be  cheerfully  followed."  * 

Yours  in  all  sincerity,  &c. 

*  Defence  of  Restricted  Com. 


LETTER  III. 

BAPTISM    NOT    A    TERM    OF    COMMUNION  : BAPTIST 

CONCESSIONS THE      ARGUMENT      FROM     JOHN'S 

BAPTISM. 

Introduction — Baptists  themselves  deny  baptism  to  be  a 
sine  qua  non  for  communion — The  want  of  baptism 
not  a  disqualification  in  the  apostles'  days — The  com- 
municants at  the  first  supper  were  without  Christian 
baptism — Proofs  that  John's  baptism  was  not  Christian 
baptism — (1.)  Their  object  and  import  distinct — (2.) 
A  distinction  carefully  preserved  between  them  by 
the  N.  T.  writers — (3.)  John's  disciples  after  the 
resurrection  rebaptized — (4.)  Christian  baptism  not 
instituted  till  after  the  resurrection — (5.)  Christian 
baptism  an  ordinance  of  Christ's;  John's  was  not — 
Others  besides  the  eleven  disciples  communed  stead- 
fastly without  baptism — Conclusion. 

Mr  Dear  Friend  : — We  are  now  to  examine 
the  ground  upon  which  you  profess  to  base  your 
practice  of  restricting  the  Lord's  supper  from 
members  of  other  denominations;  namely,  the 
position  that  Christian  baptism,  or,  as  we  always 
mean  by  this,  an  immersional  profession  of  Chris- 
tianity, is  a  divinely  prescribed  term  of  com- 
munion.   If  this  were  so,  then  your  practice,  so  far 


48  OPEN    COMMUNION. 

at  least  as  restricting  the  supper  from  the  unim- 
mersed  is  concerned,  would  not  merely  be  right 
and  justifiable  ;  it  could  not  lawfully  be  otherwise. 
But  as  it  is,  I  regard  it  as  the  paltriest  of 
assumptions  which,  if  stripped  of  all  its  sophistry 
and  of  the  authority  and  influence  of  a  few  great 
names,  would  shrink  in  shame  from  publicity. 

Perhaps  I  ought  to  have  remarked  before, 
that  I  concur  with  you  fully  in  the  persuasion 
that  the  Scriptures,  correctly  interpreted  and 
properly  understood,  require  every  individual,  on 
making  a  profession  of  Christianity,  to  do  it  by 
being  immersed  in  the  name  of  Christ  or  of  the 
Trinity ;  and  that  if  any  had  refused  to  do  this 
in  the  apostles''  days,  when  there  was  no  differ- 
ence of  opinion  about  what  baptism  was,  or  who 
its  subjects  were,  he  would  not  have  been  a  law- 
ful subject  for  communion.  And  I  would  add 
that  if  there  could  be  no  honest  professors  of 
Christianity  now  except  Baptists,  I  should  have  no 
hesitation  in  concluding  with  you  that  we  have 
no  right  to  commune  with  any  others.  But  as  it 
is,  not  only  do  I  hesitate  to  come  to  such  a  con- 
clusion, but  my  feelings  of  Christian  duty,  charity, 
and  propriety,  all  revolt  from  it.  Setting  aside 
this  fact,  however,  and  saying  nothing,  for  the 
present  at  least,  about  the  apparent  inconsistency 
of  restricted  communion  with  the  spirit  of  Christ, 


BAPTISM  NOT  A  TERM  OF  COMMUNION.  49 

let  us  see  if  the  want  of  an  immersional  profession 
of  disci pleship  to  the  Savior  is  really,  in  itself,  a 
divinely  recognised  disqualification  for  observing 
the  Lord's  supper. 

And  first,  let  me  call  your  attention  to  the  fact 
that,  if  baptism  be  a  term  of  communion,  we  must 
of  necessity  regard  unimmersed  Christians  as 
unqualified  for  communing  even  among  them- 
selves. This  is  inevitable.  If  Christian  baptism 
be  a  divinely  constituted  sine  qua  non  for  com- 
munion, obviously  no  one  has  a  right  to  the 
Lord's  supper  without  it.  So  that  if  we  really 
consider  it  an  indispensable  term  of  communion, 
we  must  regard  the  unimmersed  as  doing  what 
they  have  no  right  to  do  at  all,  and  as  violating 
their  Master's  will  whenever  they  partake  of  the 
sacramental  loaf  and  cup  in  remembrance  of  him. 
But  what  say  those  who  stand  forth  most  con- 
spicuously as  the  defenders  of  restricted  com- 
munion ?  Just  what  you  say ;  just  what  might 
be  expected  of  those  who  take  false  positions,  the 
consistent  carrying  out  of  which  is  always  sure  to 
prove  their  falsity.  In  one  breath  they  deny 
what  in  another  they  affirm.  This  moment,  like 
yourself,  they  contend  that  Christian  baptism  is 
an  indispensable  term  of  communion.  The  very 
next,  perhaps,  they  unite  with  you  in  assuring  the 
world  that  Pedobaptists  are  entitled  to  the  Lord's 
5 


50  OPEN    COMMUNION. 

supper.  Says  one,  "  The  New  Testament  does 
not  forbid  the  unbaptized  from  receiving  the 
Lord's  supper."  *  Says  another,  "  Does  a  Pedo- 
baptist  honestly  believe,  after  an  impartial  exami- 
nation of  the  best  evidences  to  which  he  can  gain 
access  on  the  subject,  that  he  has  received  Chris- 
tian baptism,  and  that  he  has  truly  entered  the 
congregation  of  Christ  in  the  way  of  divine 
appointment  ?  Let  him  prosecute  the  course  he 
has  adopted.  All  the  Lord's  children  have  an 
undoubted  right  to  his  table,  because  whatever  is 
his  is  theirs."  f  Says  a  third,  "  Undoubtedly  ail 
Christians,"  and  Pedobaptists  among  them,  "  are 
entitled,  in  the  strictest  sense  of  the  term,  not  only 
to  the  Lord's  supper,  but  to  all  the  privileges  of 
the  Christian  church.  Sincerely  believing  they 
have  entered  the  visible  church  in  the  way  of 
divine  appointment,  their  title  to  its  peculiar 
privileges  inevitably  follows,  since  every  Christian 
is  under  a  sacred  obligation  to  recognise  what  he 
sincerely  believes  to  be  the  divine  will.  They  do 
right  in  partaking  of  the  Lord's  supper,  though  in 
our  opinion  unbaptized."  \  And  another,  more 
recent  still,  says,  "There  is  no  reason  why  we 
should   breathe   a  murmur  against  them  because 

*  Kinghorn,  as  quoted  by  Hall, 
f  Howell,  on  Com.,  pp.  99,  107. 
\  J.  G.  Fuller,  on  Com.  Conversation,  iii. 


BAPTISM  NOT  A  TERM  OF  COMMUNION.  51 

they  take  the  Lord's  supper  in  their  own 
churches."  *  Now  with  what  sincerity  can  you 
allow  that  persons  whom  you  regard  as  destitute 
of  Christian  baptism,  are  entitled  to  the  Lord's 
supper,  and  may  lawfully  commune  among  them- 
selves, while  you  contend  that  Christian  baptism 
is  a  divinely  prescribed  qualification  for  com- 
munion ?  What  regard  for  God's  requirements 
or  jealousy  for  his  will  is  there  in  such  a  course 
as  this  ?  It  seems  to  me  neither  more  nor  less 
than  a  downright  tampering  with  the  mind  of 
God,  to  believe  baptism  to  be  a  divinely  required 
preliminaiy  to  communion,  and  yet  allow  that 
persons  do  right  to  commune  without  it,  and  that 
there  is  no  reason  why  we  should  breathe  a  mur- 
mur ao-ainst  them  for  so  doino;.  If  Christian 
baptism  is  a  divinely  prescribed  term  of  com- 
munion, and,  as  we  hold,  nothing  is  Christian 
baptism  but  a  professing  of  faith  in  Christ  by 
immersion,  then  Pedobaptists  are  not  entitled  to  a 
place  at  the  sacramental  table,  and  do  not  do 
right  in  communing.  But  if,  as  you  say,  they  are 
undoubtedly  entitled  to  it,  and  even  do  right  in 
partaking  of  it,  then  you  admit,  in  their  case  at 
least,  that  Christian  baptism  is  not  a  necessary 
qualification,  and,  of  course,  not  in  itself  a  divinely 

*  Curtis,  on  Com.,  p.  190. 


52  OPEN    COMMUNION. 

constituted  qualification.  And  this  is  all  that  I 
am  contending  for.  I  have  it,  therefore,  in  my 
favor,  at  the  outset,  that  you  agree  with  me,  that 
the  want  of  Christian  baptism  is  not  a  necessary 
barrier  to  lawful  communion.  And  here  I  might 
leave  the  question  as  conceded ;  but  I  desire  to 
show  that  I  stand  on  a  firmer  basis  than  your 
concessions. 

Let  us  turn,  then,  to  the  consideration  of  a 
second  fact.  It  is  this,  that  the  want  of  Christian 
baptism  was  not  a  disqualification  in  the  apostles' 
days. 

And  first,  I  think  it  susceptible  of  the  clearest 
demonstration  that  the  participators  of  the  Lord's 
supper  at  its  institution  were  without  it.  I  know 
you  hold  that  they  were  not ;  and  that,  because 
such  was  the  case,  Christian  baptism  is  essential  to 
communion.  But  is  not  this  a  begging  of  the 
whole  question  ?  Is  it  not  assuming  (1)  that 
John's  baptism  was  identical  with  Christian  bap- 
tism, (2)  that  the  twelve  had  all  received  it,  and 
(3)  that  because  they  had  received  it,  therefore  the 
want  of  it  would  have  disqualified  them  for  the 
supper  ?  Even  if  it  were  a  fact  that  the  twelve 
were  baptized,  it  is  impossible  to  conceive  how 
you  can  conclude  from  this  that  baptism  is  a  sine 
qua  non  for  communion.  Had  it  been  recorded 
that  they  were  not  allowed  to  commune  for  want 


BAPTISM    NOT    A    TERM    OF    COMMUNION.         53 

of  baptism,  or  until  they  had  been  baptized,  then 
your  conclusion  would  be  natural  and  just.  But 
the  mere  fact,  supposing  it  to  be  a  fact,  that  they 
were  baptized  as  they  sat  around  the  Lord's  table, 
affords  not  the  least  shadow  of  evidence  that  it 
was  necessary  for  them  to  be  baptized  before  they 
took  their  places  there.  If,  however,  it  can  be 
shown  that  this  is  not  a  fact,  but  that  they  com- 
muned without  having  received  Christian  baptism, 
your  position  that  this  ordinance  is  indispensable 
to  communion,  is  at  once  and  for  ever  overthrown. 
And  such,  I  promise  to  show  you,  was  the  case. 

In  saying  this,  I  do  not  say  that  the  Savior's 
disciples  had  not  received  the  baptism  of  John, 
any  more  than  that  they  had  not  received  the 
baptism  of  the  Holy  Ghost,  whatever  the  truth  in 
these  cases  may  be ;  but  merely  that  they  had 
not  received  the  baptism  which,  by  the  apostolic 
commission,  we  are  authorized  to  administer.  I 
simply  affirm  that  their  case  is  similar  to  that  of 
our  Pedobaptist  brethren,  that  their  discipleship 
to  Christ  was  not  entered  upon  by  an  immersion 
in  the  name  of  the  Father,  the  Son,  and  the 
Holy  Ghost.  I  will  not  deny  that  in  a  certain 
sense  they  may  all  have  been  baptized.  Nor  will 
I  deny  that  in  a  certain  sense  the  members  of  the 
Greek  church  are  baptized,  that  is  to  say,  they  are 
immersed.  But  being  immersed  in  infancy,  neither 
5* 


54  OPEN    COMMUNION. 

you  nor  I  can  admit  that  they  have  received  the 
ordinance  of  Christian  baptism,  since  this  is  not 
merely  an  immersion,  but  an  immersion  in  token 
of  a  profession  of  faith  in  our  crucified  and  risen 
Lord.  Just  so — without  placing  the  ordinance 
administered  by  John  upon  the  same  level  with 
the  infant-immersion  of  the  Greek  church,  or,  in 
the  least,  questioning  its  divine  origin — allowing 
that  the  Savior's  disciples  had  been  baptized  by 
John,  I  hold  that  they  were  without  Christian  bap- 
tism, unless,  after  having  received  John's  baptism, 
they  were  immersed  again  and  upon  a  profession 
of  faith  in  Christ,  which  no  one  supposes  ;  or 
unless  the  institution  of  the  forerunner  and  the 
ordinance  of  Christian  baptism  are  one  and  the 
same.  That  they  are  not  identical,  but  are  essen- 
tially different,  if  not  a  self-evident  proposition,  is 
certainly  susceptible  of  the  clearest  demonstration. 
The  first  circumstance  I  would  refer  to  as  evi- 
dence of  the  want  of  identity  between  these  two 
institutes,  is  the  obvious  difference  between  the 
object  and  import  of  each.  I  admit  that  the  out- 
ward act  was  the  same  in  both  cases— an  im- 
mersion. So  is  it  in  Christian  baptism,  and  the 
infant-baptism  of  the  Greek  church.  But  this  is 
no  proof  that  the  two  are  one  ordinance.  I 
admit,  too,  that  they  were  both  sanctioned  by  the 
authority  of  Christ.     So  was  the  Jewish  passover, 


BAPTISM    NOT    A    TERM    OF    COMMUNION.         55 

as  well  as  the  Lord's  supper.  This,  however,  is 
no  evidence  that  the  two  ordinances  are  identical. 
In  order  to  make  out  an  identity  of  acts,  it  must 
be  shown  that  their  meaning  and  the  end  for 
which  they  were  sanctioned  are  the  same.  And 
here  lies  the  great  difference  between  these  two 
baptisms.  Their  meaning  and  the  end  for  which 
they  were  instituted,  are  widely  different. 

John  was  Christ's  forerunner.  As  such,  the 
great  end  for  which  he  was  commissioned  was  "  to 
make  ready  a  people  prepared  for  the  Lord,"  to 
bring  the  Jews  into  a  state  of  expectation  for  the 
immediate  appearance  of  the  long  promised  Mes- 
siah, and  of  readiness  for  receiving  him  as  such, 
whenever  it  was  evident  who  he  was.  In  the 
accomplishment  of  this  end,  the  baptism  he  ad- 
ministered served  a  two-fold  purpose.  In  the  first 
place,  it  was  to  be  instrumental,  like  the  Savior's 
own  miracles,  in  affording  to  the  Jews  evidence  as 
to  who  the  true  Messiah  was.  Consequently,  im- 
mediately after  the  baptism  of  Jesus,  we  find  the 
heavens  were  opened,  and  a  voice  descended 
saying,  "  This  is  my  beloved  Son  in  whom  I  am 
well  pleased."  Up  to  this  moment,  even  John 
himself  knew  not  Jesus  as  the  Messiah,  the  Son 
of  God,  however  well  acquainted  he  had  been  with 
him  before  as  the  Son  of  Mary  and  a  person  of 
remarkable  sanctity  of  life.     His  own  testimony 


56  OPEN    COMMUNION. 

is,  in  order  that  the  Messiah  should  be  made 
manifest  unto  Israel,  therefore  am  I  come  baptizing 
in  water.*  This  was  one  important  object  to  be 
accomplished  by  means  of  the  rite  administered 
by  the  son  of  Zechariah,  an  object  for  which 
Christian  baptism  was  never  intended.  But  it 
was  also  designed  to  mark  such  as  professed  to 
receive  the  message  he  proclaimed.  As  the  great 
end  of  his  ministry  was  not  to  make  disciples  of 
Jesus  of  Nazareth,  but  to  make  ready  a  people 
prepared  for  the  Messiah's  coming,  so  he  adminis- 
tered baptism,  not  upon  a  profession  of  Chris- 
tianity, but  in  token  of  repentance  and  an  avowed 
readiness  to  receive  as  the  Messiah  him  who  was 
soon  to  be  manifested  to  them  as  such.  "  His 
language  was  precise  and  appropriate.  It  was 
not  a  demand  of  present  faith  in  any  known  indi- 
vidual, but  was  limited  to  a  future  faith  on  a 
certain  personage  who  was  about  to  evince  his 
title  to  the  character  he  assumed  by  his  personal 
appearance  and  miracles."  lie  administered  "  the 
baptism  of  repentance,  saying  unto  the  people 
that  they  should  believe  on  him  who  was  to 
come."f  Christian  baptism,  however,  demands  a 
present  faith.     It  is  administered,  not  in  token 

*  John  i.  31.  f  Acts  xix.  4. 


BAPTISM   NOT    A   TERM    OF    COMMUNION.        5*7 

that  such  as  receive  it  will  believe,  but  that  they 
do  believe — not  on  a  Messiah  about  to  come,  but 
on  one  already  come.  If  this  ordinance  were 
identical  with  John's  baptism,  it  would  be  an  over- 
turning of  the  whole  gospel,  a  rejection  of  Jesus 
of  Nazareth  as  the  Christ,  a  looking  for  a  Mes- 
siah yet  to  come ;  an  object  utterly  inconsistent 
with  its  design. 

The  import  also  of  these  institutions,  as  well  as 
their  object,  is  totally  distinct.  Christian  baptism 
is  a  baptism  unto  Christ.  It  is  significant  of  union 
professed  to  the  crucified,  buried,  and  risen  Sa- 
vior, and  in  Him  of  union  to  the  Holy  Ghost  as 
a  renewed  person,  and  to  the  Father  as  a  son. 
"Ye  are  all  children  (or  sons)  of  God,"  says  an 
apostle,  "by  faith  in  Christ  Jesus,"  who  is  preemi- 
nently the  Son  of  God  ;  "  for  as  many  of  you  as 
have  been  baptized  into  Christ  have  put  on 
Christ  ;"*  that  is,  have  professedly,  and  really,  if 
your  profession  is  true  (which  the  apostle  assumes 
it  is),  become  united  to  Christ,  and  by  your  union 
to  him  who  is  the  Son  of  God,  ye  are,  in  him, 
sons  of  God  too,  transformed  through  the  renewing 
of  the  Holy  Ghost  into  the  image  of  Him  who  is 
the  first-born  among  many  brethren.  But  the 
baptism  of  John  was  not  a  baptism  unto  Christ. 

*  Gal.  iii.  26,  27. 


58  OPEN    COMMUNION. 

If  it  had  been,  instead  of  seeing  multitudes  flock 
to  him  to  be  baptized,  he  would  scarcely  have  seen 
one,  so  inconsistent  was  the  lowly  character  of 
Christ  with  the  Jewish  idea  of  what  their  Messiah 
was  to  be.  Besides,  the  idea  of  their  having  been 
baptized  unto  Christ,  is  incompatible  with  the  fact 
that  their  baptism  was  in  token  of  their  being 
prepared  for  his  coming.  Nor  was  the  ordinance 
they  received  administered  in  the  name  of  Christ, 
or  of  the  Trinity.  This  is  allowed  on  all  hands. 
And  it  is  evident,  too,  from  the  reply  of  those 
disciples  of  John  to  Paul  at  Ephesus,  who  said, 
they  had  not  so  much  as  heard  of  a  Holy  Ghost ; 
and  from  Paul's  asking  them,  "  Unto  what,  then, 
were  ye  baptized  ?"  that  is,  "  unto  what  if  not  unto 
the  name  of  Christ?"  This,  I  say,  aside  from 
other  evidence,  is  sufficient  to  show  that  John's 
baptism  was  not  administered  in  the  name  of  the 
Trinity,  or  upon  a  profession  of  Christianity.  His 
language  was  not  like  Peter's — "  Repent  and  be 
baptized  every  one  of  you  in  the  name  of  Jesus 
for  the  remission  of  sins,  and  ye  shall  receive  the 
Holy  Ghost,"  but  "  I  baptize  you  unto,  or  in  token 
of,  repentance ;  bring  forth,  therefore,  fruits  meet 
for  repentance,  and  believe  on  him  who  shall 
soon  come."  His  baptism  was  not,  therefore,  a 
symbolic  putting  on  of  Christ,  or  a  profession  of 
union  and  discipleship  to  him.     It  was  simply  an 


BAPTISM    NOT    A    TERM    OF    COMMUNION.        59 

expression  of  preparedness  to  embrace  as  the  Mes- 
siah him  who  was  about  to  appear  in  that  charac- 
ter, together,  of  course,  with  that  repentance  and 
purification  of  life  implied  in  being  prepared  for 
his  coming. 

We  see,  therefore,  that  the  object  and  meaning 
of  these  two  institutions  are  essentially  distinct. 
The  consequence  must  be  that  the  baptisms  them- 
selves are  distinct,  and  not  to  be  regarded  as  one 
and  the  same. 

The  same  conclusion  forces  itself  upon  us  when 
we  consider  the  distinction  always  preserved  be- 
tween these  two  ordinances  by  the  New  Testament 
writers.  If  the  two  were  identical,  why  should 
those  who  practised  Christian  baptism  ever  speak 
of  a  "John's  baptism,1'  as  though  it  were  some- 
thing different  from  that  which  they  themselves 
administered  ?  That  any  persons  previous  to  the 
instituting  of  Christian  baptism,  or  who  had  never 
heard  of  Christian  baptism,  should  have  called  the 
rite  administered  by  the  forerunner  and  his  disci- 
ples "John's  baptism,"  in  distinction  from  the 
divers  other  baptisms  then  employed,  is  to  be 
expected.  To  expect  anything  else  would  be  to 
look  for  something  contrary  to  nature.  But  if 
Christian  baptism  is  a  mere  continuation  of  John's, 
if  the  two  institutions  are  identical  one  with  the 
other,  if  they  are  not  essentially  distinct,  it  is  a 


60  OPEN    COMMUNION. 

little  singular  that  those  who  practised  the  former 
should  thus  carefully  avoid  confounding  it  with 
the  latter.  Matthew,  Mark,  and  Luke,  for  exam- 
ple, who  wrote  several  years  after  the  death  of 
Christ,  never  call  the  forerunner's  act  baptism 
simply ;  but  they  invariably  designate  it  "  the  bap- 
tism of  John,"  "  the  baptism  of  repentance,"  "  the 
baptism  of  water,"  and  so  on,  as  carefully  as  they 
do  the  baptism  of  the  Holy  Ghost  by  its  appro- 
priate epithets.  Peter,  too,  speaks  of  "  the  bap- 
tism which  John  preached,"*  as  though  it  were 
something  different  from  that  he  himself  preached. 
Paul,  too,  calls  it  "  the  baptism  of  repentance,"! 
in  distinction  from  the  ordinance  of  Christian  bap- 
tism. Now  the  question  is,  If  the  two  ordinances 
are  identical,  why  is  one  of  them  thus  carefully 
and  invariably  designated  by  those  who  adminis- 
tered the  other,  while  they  never  designate  the 
ordinance  they  themselves  administered  by  any 
other  name  than  baptism  ?  Can  anything  account 
for  this  distinction,  carefully  preserved  between 
them,  but  the  fact  that  the  two  ordinances  were 
essentially  distinct,  and  felt  to  be  so  ?  The  ordi- 
nance they  themselves  administered,  they  called, 
by  way  of  preeminence,  baptism  merely ;  that  of 
the  forerunner,  by  way  of  distinction,  the  baptism 

*  Acta  x.  37.  f  Acts  xiii.  24;  xix.  4. 


BAPTISM    NOT    A   TERM    OF    COMMUNION.        61 

of  repentance,  and  so  on.  They  invariably  leave 
oft*  the  distinguishing  terms  that  are  employed  in 
connexion  with  the  baptism  John  administered, 
and  thus  make  a  distinction  between  their  own 
institution  and  his.  To  me  this  fact  seems  of  no 
little  weight  in  deciding  the  question. 

Another  circumstance,  and  one  that  affords  in- 
dubitable evidence  that  these  institutions  are  dis- 
tinct, is  the  fact  that  those  of  John's  disciples  who 
became  converts  to  Christianity  after  the  Savior's 
resurrection,  on  becoming  such,  were  rebaptized ; 
that  is,  were  baptized  unto  Christ.  An  instance 
of  this  we  have  in  the  baptism  of  twelve  of  the 
forerunner's  disciples  at  Ephesus,  the  account  of 
which  is  given  in  Acts  xix.  The  apostle  Paul, 
having  come  to  Ephesus  and  found  these  disciples 
there,  asked  them  if  they  had  received  the  Holy 
Ghost  since  they  first  believed.  Their  reply  was, 
"  We  have  not  so  much  as  heard  whether  there 
be  any  Holy  Ghost."  Whether  it  was  because,  in 
those  days,  the  reception  of  the  Holy  Ghost  was  a 
usual  accompaniment  of  Christian  baptism,  or  be- 
cause tliis  ordinance  was  administered  in  the  name 
of  the  Holy  Ghost,  in  connexion  with  that  of  the 
Father  and  of  the  Son ;  yet  so  it  was,  that  their 
saying  they  had  not  so  much  as  heard  of  a  Holy 
Ghost,  disclosed  the  fact  that  they  had  not  re- 
ceived Christian  baptism.  This  led  Paul  to  inquire 
6 


62  OPEN    COMMUNION. 

of  them,  "  Unto  what,  then,  were  ye  baptized," 
i.  e.  if  not  unto  the  name  of  Christ  ?  And  they 
said,  "  Unto  John's  baptism,"  in  token  of  repent- 
ance and  an  expectation  of  a  Messiah  to  come. 
Then  said  Paul,  "John  veriiy  baptized  [adminis- 
tered] the  baptism  of  repentance,  saying  to  the 
people  that  they  should  believe  on  him  who  should 
come  after  him,"  explaining  this  by  adding,  "  that 
is,  on  Christ  Jesus."  And  when  they  heard  this, 
we  are  told  they  were  baptized  in  or  unto*  the 
name  of  the  Lord  Jesus.  They  made  a  profession 
of  faith  in  Christ,  and  were  no  longer  disciples  of 
John,  or  expecters  of  a  coming  Messiah. 

I  can  hardly  suppose  you  will  contend  that  there 
was  no  rebaptism  in  this  case.  It  is  impossible  to 
belieye  that  the  sentence,  "  and  when  they  heard 
this  they  were  baptized  in  the  name  of  the  Lord 
Jesus,"  refers  to  all  who  came  to  Jo/m,  and  not  to 
these  twelve  individuals  at  Ephesus ;  in  which 
case,  the  record  contained  here  would  be,  not  that 
these  persons  received  baptism  when  they  had 
heard  Paul's  explanation,  but  that  all  who  heard 
the  forerunner  were  immediately  baptized  by  him 
in  the  name  of  the  Lord  Jesus.  This  is  contrary 
to  fact,  and  a  view  which  no  intelligent  and  candid 
reader  of  the  passage  can  take,  as  the  warmest 

*  In  the  Greek  the  preposition  is  the  same  here  as  in 
verse  3,  where  it  is  translated  "  unto." 


BAPTISM    NOT    A    TERM    OF    COMMUNION.        G3 

friends  and  ablest  defenders  of  your  restricted 
views  confess.  Prof.  Ripley,  for  example,  in  liis 
note  on  the  passage  says,  "  Some  writers  have 
contended  that  these  men  did  not  receive  baptism 
after  Paul  met  with  them.  But  as  to  the  simple 
inquiry  whether  they  were  baptized  anew,  an 
affirmative  answer  seems  unavoidable  if  we  follow 
the  most  obvious  and  natural  meaning  of  the  pas- 
sage as  conveyed  both  in  our  translation  and  in 
the  original  Greek."  Prof.  Curtis  expresses  his 
view  of  the  passage  thus:  "The  former  baptism 
of  these  persons  was  not  an  avowalof  their  per- 
sonal faith  in  the  fundamental  principles  of  Chris- 
tian doctrine — it  was  not  a  credible  profession  to 
the  world  of  faith  in  Jesus  or  the  Holy  Ghost. 
Paul,  therefore,  pronounced  it  invalid  in  toto. 
They  Avere  rebaptized."*  And  Prof.  Hackett,  a 
very  accurate  interpreter  of  New  Testament  Greek, 
in  his  Commentary  on  the  Acts,  places  at  the  be- 
ginning of  the  nineteenth  chapter,  the  heading, 
"Paul  comes  to  Ephesus  and  rebaptizes  certain 
disciples  of  John ;"  and  under  the  fifth  verse  he  has 
this  note,  "  Some  of  the  older  writers  maintained 
that  Luke  records  these  words  ('Now  they  having 
heard  were  baptized'),  as  a  continuation  of  Paul's 
remarks.  The  object"  of  this  interpretation,  he  adds, 

*  Christian  Review,  vol.  xi.  pp.  199,  200. 


64  OPEN    COMMUNION. 

"  was  to  rescue  the  passage  from  those  who  appealed 
to  it  in  order  to  justify  rebaptism.  This,  how- 
ever, misstates  the  fact  in  regard  to  John's  baptism. 
He  did  not  administer  it  in  the  name  of  Jesus.  No 
one,  at  present,  contends  for  that  interpretation." 

Taking  it  for  granted,  then,  that  you  admit  the 
rebaptism  of  these  persons,  for  there  can  be  no 
doubt  about  it,  the  only  inquiry  to  be  settled  is, 
Was  their  first  baptism  John's  ?  Nor  is  there  any 
room  for  doubt  here.  We  have  their  own  words 
for  it  that  they  "  were  baptized  unto  John's  bap- 
tism." And  Paul,  so  far  from  intimating  to  them 
that  the  baptism  they  had  received  could  not  have 
been  a  genuine  John's  baptism,  but  must  have 
been  some  spurious  or  defective  administration  of 
it,  and  that  they  ought,  on  this  account,  to  be  bap- 
tized anew,  conceded  that  it  was  genuine,  by  say- 
ing, "John  indeed  baptized  the  baptism  of  repent- 
ance." As  much  as  if  he  had  said,  "  You  may 
indeed  have  received  John's  baptism ;  but  this  is 
not  a  baptism  unto  Christ."  Upon  hearing  which, 
it  was  very  natural  they  should  be,  as  we  read 
they  were,  "baptized  unto  the  name  of  the  Lord 
Jesus."  A  most  conclusive  proof  that  the  baptism 
of  John  and  the  Christian  ordinance  are  two  things 
essentially  distinct. 

In  addition  to  the  fact  recorded  in  these  verses, 
our  knowledge  of  the  popularity  of  John  and  of 


BAPTISM    NOT    A    TERM    OF    COMMUNION.         65 

the  multitudes  who  flocked  to  his  baptism,  forces  us 
to  believe  that  there  were  many  others  in  the  same 
situation  with  these  twelve  disciples.  Look  at  the 
terms  in  which  the  effects  of  John's  ministry  are 
described  :  "  Then  went  out  to  him  Jerusalem,  and 
all  Judea,  and  all  the  region  round  about  Jordan, 
and  were  baptized  of  him  in  Jordan,  confessing  their 
sins."  Such  language  is  nowhere  used  to  represent 
the  success  of  the  apostles.  As  Robert  Hall  remarks, 
"  their  converts  are  numerically  stated  ;  and  at  some 
distance  from  our  Lord's  ascension  they  appear  to 
have  amounted  to  about  five  thousand,  while  a 
great  majority  of  the  nation  continued  impenitent 
and  incredulous.  We  read  of  no  party  formed 
against  the  son  of  Zechariah,  no  persecution  raised 
against  his  followers;  and  such  was  the  reverence 
in  which  he  continued  to  be  held  after  his  death, 
that  the  Pharisees,  those  determined  enemies  of 
the  gospel,  dared  not  avow  their  disbelief  of  his 
minion,  because  all  the  people  considered  him  as 
a  prophet.  From  these  considerations  it  is  very 
evident,  if  we  suppose  the  converts  made  by  the 
apostles  to  have  been  universally  baptized  on  their 
admission  into  the  church  (a  fact  not  doubted  by 
our  opponents),  that  multitudes  of  them  must 
have  been  in  the  same  situation  with  the  disciples 
at  Ephesus.  Among  the  converts  on  the  day  of 
Pentecost,  and  at  subsequent  periods,  there  must 
6* 


66  OPEN    COMMUNION. 

have  been  no  inconsiderable  number  who  had  for 
a  time  been  sufficiently  awakened  by  the  ministry 
of  John  to  comply  with  this  ordinance ;  yet  it  is 
evident  from  the  narrative,  as  well  as  admitted  by 
our  opponents,  that  Peter  enjoined  on  them  all, 
without  exception,  the  duty  of  being  immersed  in 
the  name  of  Christ."*  And  we  are  told  that  all 
who  gladly  received  the  word  were  baptized.  No 
exceptions  are  recorded  as  having  been  made 
among  all  those  three  thousand  converts  in  favor 
of  such  of  them  as  may  have  received  baptism  at 
the  hands  of  John.  You  say,  however,  that  none 
of  these  could  have  been  disciples  of  John,  inas- 
much as  they  were  all  pricked  in  their  hearts  and 
exhorted  to  repent  and  be  baptized  for  the  remis- 
sion of  sins ;  an  exhortation  which  John's  disci- 
ples had  already  received.  But  this  is  making 
out,  that  the  Christian  church  was  coextensive 
with  the  forerunner's  baptism,  since  it  proceeds 
upon  the  idea,  that  his  disciples,  as  such,  were 
professing  Christians  ;  and  not  only  so,  but  that 
Jerusalem,  and  all  Judea,  and  all  the  region  round 
about  Jordan,  were  Christians,  and  needed  not  to 
be  pricked  in  their  hearts  and  exhorted  to  repent, 
which  every  one  knows  is  contrary  to  fact.  Can 
you  believe,  then,  that  of  these   three  thousand 

*  Works,  vol.  i.  pp.  300,  301. 


BAPTISM    NOT    A   TERM    OF    COMMUNION.        67 

every  individual  must  have  been  of  those  who  had 
not  received  John's  baptism  ?  "  When,"  to  use 
the  language  of  Hall,  "  the  number  of  his  con- 
verts was  so  prodigious,  when  the  submission  to 
his  institute  was  almost  national,  when,  of  so  small 
a  number  as  twelve,  two  at  least  of  the  apostles 
were  of  his  disciples,  who  can  doubt,  for  a  mo- 
ment, that  some,  at  least,  of  the  multitudes  who 
were  converted  on  or  after  the  day  of  Pentecost, 
consisted  of  such  as  had  previously  submitted  to 
the  baptism  of  John  ?  Is  it  possible  that  the 
ministry  of  the  forerunner  and  of  the  apostles  of 
our  Lord  should  both  have  been  productive  of 
such  great  effects  among  the  same  people,  at  the 
distance  of  a  few  years,  without  operating,  in 
a  single  instance,  in  the  same  direction  and 
upon  the  same  people  ?  No.  But  if  such  as 
professed  their  faith  in  Christ,  under  the  ministry 
of  the  apostles,  were  baptized  upon  that  profes- 
sion, without  any  consideration  of  their  having 
been  previously  immersed  by  John  or  not,  what 
stronger  proofs  can  be  desired  that  the  institutes 
in  question  are  totally  distinct  ?  Were  we  satis- 
fied," continues  Hall,  "  with  an  argumentum  ad 
hominem,  with  the  sort  of  proof  sufficient  to 
silence  our  opponents,  here  the  matter  might  safely 
rest.  But  independent  of  their  concession,  it  is 
manifest  from  the  whole  tenor  of  the  Acts,  that 


68  OPEN    COMMUNION. 

the  baptismal  rite  was  universally  administered  to 
the  converts  to  Christianity,  subsequent  to  the  day 
of  Pentecost."* 

But  what  completely  settles  the  question  is  the 
fact  that  Christian  baptism  was  not  instituted  till 
after  the  resurrection  of  Christ,  when  the  object 
of  John's  baptism  was  at  an  end.  It  was  now  no 
longer  necessary  "  to  make  ready  a  people  pre- 
pared for  the  Lord."  When  Christ  arose  from  the 
dead,  and  the  seal  was  thereby  set  to  his  Messiah- 
ship,  inasmuch  as  by  his  resurrection  he  "  was 
declared  to  be  the  Son  of  God  with  power,"  it 
was  fully  revealed  who  the  Messiah  was.  The 
object  of  the  ministry  of  one  who  came,  as  a  fore- 
runner, to  prepare  a  way  for  the  Lord,  was  then, 
if  not  before,  necessarily  at  an  end,  and,  together 
with  it,  ceased  the  object  of  his  baptism.  There 
was  no  longer  any  propriety  in  preaching  faith  in 
a  Messiah  yet  to  come.  A  new  era  had  com- 
menced. Those  who  had  not  hitherto  acknow- 
ledged Jesus  as  the  Christ,  the  Son  of  the  living 
God,  and  should  henceforth  believe  on  him,  now 
that  he  was  crucified  and  risen,  were  to  make  an 
acknowledgment  and  profession  of  this  faith  by 
an  outward,  self-denying  act,  emblematic  of  union 
to  him  as  the  crucified,  buried,  and  risen  One. 

*  Works,  vol.  i.  pp.  301,  302. 


BAPTISM    NOT    A    TERM    OF    COMMUNION.         69 

This  act  is  the  submission  to  Christian  baptism. 
And  the  words  of  the  institution  of  this  ordinance 
are  contained  in  Matt,  xxviii.  19  ;  words  not  given 
till  after  the  Savior's  resurrection  :  "  Go,  teach  all 
nations,  baptizing  them  in  the  name  of  the  Father 
and  of  the  Son  and  of  the  Holy  Ghost."  Here 
is  the  first  of  our  hearing  anything  of  baptizing 
in  (into)  the  name  of  Christ.  This  is  not  only 
our  authority,  but,  as  the  younger  Fuller  expresses 
it,  our  primary  authority,  for  the  administration  of 
Christian  baptism.  For,  had  not  the  Savior,  after 
his  resurrection,  instituted  this  ordinance  and  en- 
joined it  upon  his  followers,  we  should  have  been 
left  without  any  ordinance  of  the  kind  to  adminis- 
ter ;  baptism  would  be  no  more  binding  than  the 
passover,  the  institute  administered  by  John  being 
obviously  obsolete  after  the  death  and  resurrection 
of  Christ.  As  we  date  the  Lord's  supper  from  its 
first  celebration,  on  the  night  before  the  crucifixion, 
so  are  we  to  date  the  ordinance  of  baptism  from 
the  giving  of  the  commission.  Each  is  to  be 
looked  for  from  the  time  of  its  institution.  No 
one  would  go  back  into  the  Jewish  passover  for 
the  former ;  nor,  with  any  more  propriety,  can  the 
latter  be  sought  in  the  rite  administered  by  John. 
This  is  rendered  doubly  clear  when  we  consider 
what  Christian  baptism  is.  "Know  ye  not,"  says 
Paul,  "  that  so  many  of  us  as  were  baptized  into 


70  OPEN    COMMUNION. 

Christ,  were  baptized  into  his  death  ?"*  As  much 
as  if  he  had  said  (as  is  evident  from  a  reference 
to  the  context  and  the  apostle's  argument  there), 
Know  ye  not  that  all  of  us  who  have  received 
Christian  baptism,  have  entered  upon  a  profession 
of  union  to  Christ  as  crucified?  Such  a  profes- 
sion was  not  made  upon  receiving  the  baptism  of 
John.  It  could  not  have  been  made.  The  idea 
of  their  Messiah's  being  a  crucified  one  was  utterly 
repugnant  to  the  minds  of  the  Jews;  and  had  the 
forerunner's  rite  been  a  baptism  unto  Christ's 
death,  he  would  not  have  seen  Jerusalem,  and  all 
Judea,  and  all  the  region  round  about  Jordan, 
coming  to  him  to  be  baptized.  And  yet  such  is 
the  ordinance  of  Christian  baptism — a  profession 
of  union  to  a  crucified  Savior.  If,  then,  the  ordi- 
nance we  are  commanded  to  administer,  could  not 
have  been  in  use  previous  to  the  Savior's  death, 
of  course  the  baptism  of  John  is  not  Christian 
baptism. | 

*  Rom.  vi.  3. 

f  It  may  be  asked,  What  were  the  baptisms  adminis- 
tered by  the  Savior's  disciples  under  his  personal  ministry  ? 
From  the  nature  of  the  ease,  they  could  not  have  been 
administrations  of  the  ordinance  of  Christian  baptism. 
They  were  not  professions  of  discipleship  to  Christ,  or  of 
faith  in  him  as  the  Messiah  ;  but,  like  the  baptism  adminis- 
tered by  John,  were  in  token  of  repentance  and  an 


BAPTISM    NOT    A    TERM    OF    COMMUNION.         71 

But  I  will  suppose  you  are  still  unsatisfied  that 
these  two  institutes  are  totally  distinct.  I  will 
suppose  it  possible  for  you  yet,  after  all  the  evi- 
dence I  have  adduced,  to  believe  that  they  were 
both  administered  for  the  same  purpose;  that 
there  is  not  a  distinction  preserved  between  them 
by  the  sacred  writers ;  that  John's  disciples  were 
in  no  case  rebaptized  after  the  resurrection  ;  and 

expectation  of  the  speedy  ushering  in  of  the  kingdom  of 
God.  "They  differed  in  no  respect  from  John's,  either 
in  the  action  itself  or  in  the  import,  but  were  a  joint 
execution  of  the  same  work ;  agreeably  to  which  we 
find  a  perfect  identity  in  the  language  which  our  Savior 
enjoined  his  disciples  to  use,  and  in  the  preaching  of 
John :  '  Repent  ye,  for  the  kingdom  of  God  is  at  hand.'  " 
— Hall.  If  the  Savior's  sanctioning  John's  baptism  with 
his  own  authority  and  directing  his  disciples  to  adminis- 
ter it,  is  any  proof,  as  some  suppose  it  is,  that  the  bap- 
tism they  gave,  during  his  personal  ministry,  was  the 
8am e  as  the  ordinance  we  are  commanded  to  administer, 
then  the  same  mode  of  reasoning  will  prove  that  the 
passover  feasts  they  prepared  and  received  at  his  bidding 
were  identical  with  the  ordinance  of  the  Lord's  supper; 
for  John's  baptism  issued  from  the  personal  authority  of 
Christ  in  no  other  sense  than  the  passover  did.  When- 
ever, by  reasoning  of  this  sort,  it  can  be  shown  that 
John's  baptism  and  Christian  baptism  are  essentially  the 
same,  it  must  follow,  by  parity  of  reasoning,  that  the 
Lord's  supper  is  one  with  the  passover.  So  that  this 
kind  of  arguing,  if  it  proves  anything,  proves  too  much. 


12  OPEN    COMMUNION. 

that  our  authority  for  administering  baptism  does 
date  farther  back  than  the  giving  of  the  commis- 
sion :  I  say,  I  will  suppose  this  possible,  though  I 
cannot  think  it  at  all  probable ;  still,  there  is  one 
consideration  more  which  must  satisfy  every  candid 
mind  of  the  utter  impossibility  of  these  institu- 
tions being  identical.  That  Christian  baptism 
was  instituted  by  the  Savior,- whether  before  his 
death  or  not,  and  derives  its  authority  from  him, 
you,  of  course,  will  not  question.  To  suppose 
anything  else  would  be  to  suppose  that  it  is  not 
an  ordinance  of  Christ's.  To  say  that  he  insti- 
tuted it  before  he  entered  upon  his  personal 
ministry  would  be  a  contradiction  in  terms.  But 
John  had  been  administering  the  baptism  of  re- 
pentance some  time  before  Christ  began  his  public 
career.  During  this  time  he  had  baptized  at  least 
two,  if  not  all,  of  those  who  afterwards  consti- 
tuted the  twelve  disciples.  These  two,  upon  the 
Savior's  being  pointed  out  to  them  immediately 
after  his  baptism,  forthwith  became  his  disciples.* 
But  they  were  not  baptized  anew  when  they  did 
this.  The  circumstances,  as  they  are  narrated, 
preclude  all  ground  for  supposing  that  they  then 
made  a  baptismal  profession  of  their  faith  in  him. 
Now  the  question  arises,  were  they  ever  baptized 

*  See  John  i.  35-40. 


BAPTISM    NOT    A    TERM    OF    COMMUNION.         73 

during  the  period  that  elapsed  between  that  mo- 
ment and  the  time  of  the  Savior's  death  ?  We 
have  no  record  of  any  such  transaction  ;  no  one 
believes  such  a  thing  ever  occurred.  It  is  a  moral 
certainty  it  did  not.  To  what  conclusion,  then, 
are  we  driven  ?  Either  that  Christian  baptism 
originated  before  the  ministry  of  Christ ;  that  is 
to  say,  was  an  institution  of  his  before  he  enjoined 
it ;  or  that  these  two  disciples  were  without  Chris- 
tian baptism  at  the  institution  of  the  supper. 
But  the  former  is  absurd.  It  follows,  therefore, 
that  at  least  Andrew  and  his  fellow  disciple  were 
unbaptized,  that  is,  they  were,  like  our  Pedobap- 
tist  brethren,  without  an  immersional  profession  of 
Christianity,  when  they  communed  with  the  Sa- 
vior around  that  first-spread  sacramental  board. 
And  if  the  remaining  twelve  disciples  had  received 
John's  baptism,  they  were  all  in  the  same  condi- 
tion. If  they  had  not,  then  they  were  in  no  sense 
baptized  ;  for  the  narrative  of  their  call,  their  leav- 
ing all  and  following  Christ,  renders  it  certain 
that  they  made  no  baptismal  profession  of  disci- 
pleship  to  him  on  so  doing.  And  it  is  very  evi- 
dent that  they  did  not  do  it  at  any  subsequent 
period  previous  to  their  Master's  death.  The  con- 
clusion, therefore,  is  irresistible,  that  they  were  all 
without  Christian  baptism  at  the  time  of  the 
institution  and  first  celebration  of  the  Lord's 
1 


*74  OPEN    COMMUNION". 

supper.  How,  then,  can  you  maintain  that 
"  baptism  is  a  divinely  required  term  of  commu- 
nion ?"  or  that  the  want  of  it  is  a  divinely  recog- 
nised disqualification  for  commemorating  our 
Lord's  death  ?  If  the  Savior  himself  did  not 
make  the  want  of  it  a  bar  to  communion,  how 
dare  we  ?  When  he  teaches  us  that  this  ordi- 
nance,, as  such,  is  not  an  essential  preliminary 
to  communion,  who  are  we  that  we  should  be 
contending  that  it  is  ? 

But  let  us  also  see  what  the  Savior's  immediate 
followers  thought  of  the  supposed  indispensable- 
ness  of  baptism  to  a  place  at  the  sacramental 
table.  Besides  the  few  who  were  present  at  the 
first  supper,  there  were,  in  the  apostles'  days, 
numbers  who  communed  steadfastly  without  ever 
having  made  a  baptismal  profession  of  Chris- 
tianity. They  were  those  who  had  embraced 
Christ  previous  to  the  day  of  Pentecost,  all  who 
were  reckoned  as  members  of  the  Christian 
church  when  the  .apostolic  commission  was  issued. 
They  consisted  of  "  above  five  hundred  brethren," 
at  least."*  These,  of  course,  had  not  received 
Christian  baptism  before  the  Savior's  resurrection, 
the  ordinance  not  then  being  instituted.  And 
"from   the  total  silence  of   Scripture,  aud  from 

*  See  1  Cor.  xv.  6. 


BAPTISM    NOT    A    TERM    OF    COMMUNION.         Vo 

other  circumstances  that  might  be  adduced,  it  is 
difficult  to  suppose  that  they  submitted  to  that 
rite  after  his  resurrection.  It  is  almost  certain 
that  some,  probably  most,  of  them  had  been  bap- 
tized by  John ;  but,  for  reasons  which  have  been 
already  assigned,  this  will  not  account  for  their 
not  submitting  to  the  Christian  ordinance.  The 
true  account  seems  to  be,  that  the  precept  of  bap- 
tism had  no  retrospective  bearing,  and  that,  con- 
sequently, its  obligation  extended  only  to  such  as 
were  converted  to  Christianity  subsequently  to 
the  time  of  its  promulgation.  Such  as  had  pro- 
fessed their  faith  in  Christ,  from  the  period  of  his 
first  manifestation,  could  not,  without  palpable 
incongruity,  recommence  that  profession,  which 
would  have  been  to  cancel  and  annul  their  former 
religious  pretensions.  With  what  propriety  could 
the  apostles  of  the  Lord,  who  had  continued  with 
him  in  his  temptations,  place  themselves  on  a  level 
with  that  multitude  which,  however  penitent  at  pre- 
sent, had  recently  demanded  his  blood  with  such 
clamorous  importunity  ?  They  were  not  converted 
to  the  Christian  religion  subsequently  to  their 
Lord's  resurrection,  nor  did  their  avowal  of  attach- 
ment to  him  commence  from  that  period,  and 
therefore  they  were  not  comprehended  under  the 
baptismal  law  which  was  propounded  for  the  re- 


76  OPEN    COMMUNION. 

gulation  of  the  conduct  of  persons  in  essentially 
different  circumstances."* 

If  this  account  be  correct, — and  can  you  show- 
that  it  is  not  ? — then  this  entire  number  of  Chris- 
tians continued  without  ever  being,  in  the  Chris- 
tian sense  of  the  word,  baptized.  And  yet,  in 
obedience  to  the  Savior's  command,  they  broke 
bread  in  remembrance  of  him.  Abstaining  from 
even  the  appearance  of  having  a  greater  regard 
for  their  Divine  Master's  ordinances  than  he  him- 
self had,  they  made  nothing  a  term  of  commu- 
nion which  he  did  not.  They  neither  considered 
themselves,  though  without  baptism,  unqualified 
for  commemorating  his  death,  and  communing 
with  him  and  his  at  the  sacramental  table,  nor 
did  they  regard  others,  in  like  circumstances,  dis- 
qualified for  uniting  with  them.  "What,  then,  are 
we  that  we  should  decline  communion  with  such  ? 
Who  hath  required  it  at  our  hands  ? 

Yours  in  all  sincerity,  &c. 

*  Hall's  Works,  vol.  i.  pp.  303,  304. 


LETTER  IV. 

BAPTISM  NOT  A  TERM  OF  COMMUNION  : — THE  AR- 
GUMENT FROM  THE  SUPPER'S  BEING  AN  ORDI- 
NANCE FOR  THE  CHRISTIAN  CHURCH AN  EX- 
AMINATION OF  THE  REASONS  FOR  REGARDING 
BAPTISM    A    TERM    OF    COMMUNION. 

The  Lord's  Supper,  an  ordinance  for  the  Saviour's  dis- 
ciples— Baptist  concessions — The  assertion  that  open 
commnnionists,  in  denying  baptism  to  be  a  term  of 
communion,  differ  from  all  Christendom,  untrue — No 
proof  from  the  commission  that  baptism  is  indispen- 
sable to  communion — None  from  the  practice  of  the 
apostles  ;  an  absurd  and  suicidal  appeal — None  from 
the  signification  of  the  ordinances ;  proof  for  the  con- 
trary— None  from  the  terms  of  eating  the  Jewish  pass- 
over — Conclusion. 

My  Dear  Friend  :  My  last  letter,  you  will  re- 
collect, was  devoted  to  showing  that  an  immer- 
sional  profession  of  Christianity  is  not  a  sine  qua 
non  for  communion.  The  two  considerations  that 
I  urged  were  your  concession  to  the  truth  of  this 
position,  and  the  fact  that  the  Saviour  and  his 
first  disciples  did  not  deem  the  want  of  baptism  a 
disqualification  for  communion.  I  have  another 
argument  which  I  will  now  offer,  and  then  pro- 
1* 


78  OPEN    COMMUNION. 

ceed  to  examine  your  reasons  for  holding  the  con- 
trary opinion.  That  argument  lies  in  the  fact 
that  the  Lord's  supper  is  an  ordinance  for  the 
Christian  church,  and,  as  such,  cannot  be  withheld 
from  any  who  are  its  members.  To  enter  into 
any  lengthened  argument  to  prove  this,  is  alto- 
gether unnecessary.  It  would  be  too  much  like 
attempting  to  prove  a  self-evident  proposition. 
The  circumstances  under  which  the  supper  was 
instituted,  the  analogy  between  it  and  the  Jewish 
passover  as  a  national  ordinance,  its  symbolical 
character,  all  plainly  pronounce  it  to  be  an  insti- 
tution for  the  observance  of  the  Christian  church. 
"  This  do  ye  in  remembrance  of  me ;"  not  the 
immersed  only,  but  all  disciples.  "  Drink  ye  all 
of  it ;"  not  merely  the  baptized,  but  all  the  mem- 
bers of  the  household  of  faith  who  may  be  pre- 
sent, for  it  is  the  Lord's  table,  designed  for  any 
who  are  members  of  his  body.  In  accordance 
with  which  the  apostle  says,  "  The  cup  of  blessing 
which  we  bless,  is  it  not  the  communion  of  the 
blood  of  Christ  ?  The  bread  which  we  break  is 
it  not  the  communion  of  the  body  of  Christ  ? 
For  we  being  many  are  one  bread  and  one  body, 
for  we    are  all  partakers  of   that  one  bread."* 

*  1  Cor.  x.  16,  17.     The  expression  "that  one  bread" 
here  denotes  the  same  as  "  this  bread"  and  "  this  bread 


BAPTISM    NOT    A    TERM    OF    COMMUNION.         *79 

Or  in  other  words,  "  the  drinking  of  the  cup 
of  blessing  which  we  bless,  is  it  not,  to  all  ap- 
pearances, a  partaking  in  common  of  the  blood 
of  Christ  ?  The  eating  of  the  loaf  which  we 
break,  is  it  not,  to  all  appearances,  a  partaking 
in  common  of  the  body  of  Christ,  the  sacri- 
fice offered  for  sin  ?  For  since  the  loaf  is 
one,  we  who  are  many  are,  to  all  appearances, 
one  ;  for  we  all  partake  of  the  one  loaf  emblema- 
tic of  the  body  of  Christ  crucified."  Sacramental 
communion  is  a  symbol  of  communion  not  only 
with  Christ,  but  with  one  another  as  individuals 
communing  with  him ;  that  is,  with  one  another 
as  Christians.  For  since  the  supper  is  one  and 
the  same  in  meaning  .and  object  wherever  among 
Christians  it  may  be  received,  they  who  partake 
of  it,  though  many,  are  thereby  declared  to  be  of 
the  same  community,  the  community  who  profess- 
edly live  hy  faith  upon  Christ  crucified.  Its 
observance  represents  a  fellowshiping  together  of 
persons,  not  as  baptized  ones,  but  as  Christians ; 
just  as  the  drinking  of  the  cup  of  demons  repre- 
sents a  fellowshipping  together  of  persons,  not  as 
unbaptized  ones,  but  as  demon-worshippers.  It  is 
consequently    an    ordinance    for   the   church    of 

of  the  Lord"  in  the  26th  and  27th  verses  of  the  next 
chapter ;  that  is,  the  bread  used  by  Christians  on  sacra- 
mental occasions  as  emblematic  of  the  Lord's  body. 


80  OPEN    COMMUNION. 

Christ.  And  so  you  allow,  notwithstanding  all 
your  efforts  to  prove  baptism  to  be  a  terra  of 
communion,  which,  if  it  were  true,  would  prove 
the  supper  to  be,  not  for  the  Christian  body,  but 
for  baptized  believers  only ;  or,  if  you  please,  for 
believers  as  persons  who  have  made  an  immer- 
sional  profession  of  Christianity.  You  agree  with 
me  that  "  the  communion  is  enjoined  upon  the 
church  till  the  second  coming  of  Christ ';"*  that  it 
is  "  a  positive  appointment  in  the  Christian 
church — a  positive  institution  of  Christianity  ;"f 
that  it  is  "  a  spiritual  repast,  not  to  be  spread  in 
the  world  or  for  the  world,  it  being  plainly  an 
institution  in  the  church  and  for  the  church.^ 

But  if  the  Lord's  supper  is  an  ordinance  for  the 
Christian  church,  and  enjoined  upon  its  members 
without  qualifications  or  restrictions,  except  that 
they  examine  themselves,  and  see  to  it  that  they 
eat  and  drink  believingly,  we  are  not  at  liberty  to 
recognise  anything  as  a  term  of  communion  which 
shall  either  exclude  ourselves  from  communing 
with  any  such,  or  preclude  them  from  communing 
with  us  when  present  together  where  it  is  admi- 
nistered.    The  only  question,  then,  that  can  be 

*  Judd's  Remains,  p.  339.    Howell  on  Com.  pp.  24,  37. 

f  Booth's  Vindication. 

X  R.  Fuller,  Bapt.  and  Com.  pp.  185,  186. 


BAPTISM    NOT    A    TERM    OF    COMMUNION.         81 

raised,  is,  "Is  the  Christian  Church  confined  to 
the  immersed  ?"  If  nothing  can  be  called  the 
church  of  Christ  but  the  Baptist  denomination, 
then  restricted  communion  is  right,  and  no  others 
should  be  suffered  to  come  to  the  Lord's  table, 
because,  not  being  in  the  church,  they  are  not  en- 
titled to  commune.  But  the  Church  of  Christ,  as  I 
have  already  shown,  is  the  body  of  his  professing 
disciples,  and  includes  them  all.  As  in  the  apostles* 
days  it  embraced  those  whose  profession  of  Chris- 
tianity had  not  been  made  by  immersion,  as  well  as 
those  whose  had,  so  now.  And  such  being  the  case, 
the  want  of  immersion,  in  itself  considered,  can 
be  no  barrier  to  communion.  As  the  younger 
Fuller  says, "  our  brethren  are  entitled  to  the  Lord's 
supper,  inasmuch  as  all  Christians  are  entitled 
to  all  the  privileges  of  the  Christian  church."*  If 
this  were  not  the  Lord's  table,  but  ours,  the  case 
would  be  different.  But  as  it  is,  we  are  not  at 
liberty  to  adopt  any  terms  of  communion  not 
established  by  the  Lord  himself.  We  are  not  at 
liberty,  therefore,  to  sanction  a  restriction  of  the 
ordinance  from  any  who  are  credible  members  of 
the  great  Christian  brotherhood.  The  apostles 
and  primitive  Christians  practised  no  such  restric- 
tions ;  nor  can  we. 

I  come  now  to  an  examination  of  the  reasons 

*  J.  G.  Fuller  on  Com.  iii.  Conv. 


82  OPEN    COMMUNION. 

you  adduce  to  prove  that  baptism  is  a  term  of 
communion. 

And  first,  you  say  that  I  differ  from  all  Chris- 
tendom, and  that  if  you  err  in  holding  baptism  to 
be  a  term  of  communion,  you  are,  at  all  events, 
in  company  with  all  Christians  of  all  ages.  This, 
however,  I  can  regard  in  no  other  light  than 
merely  as  an  attempt  to  overawe  with  the  weight 
of  authority.  And  to  be  frank,  I  must  say  I  con- 
sider it  an  attempt  altogether  unworthy  of  an 
ingenuous  and  truth-loving  mind.  For,  to  say 
nothing  of  apostolic  principles  and  practice ;  to 
say  nothing  of  the  views  of  some  of  the  noblest 
spirits  and  brightest  lights  the  Baptist  denomina- 
tion has  ever  had,  such  as  John  Bunyan,  Roger 
Williams,  Robert  Hall,  John  Foster,  the  two  Hal- 
danes,  Alexander  Carson,  Baptist  W.  Noel,  and 
so  on  ;  it  is  not  true  that  "  baptism  has  been  held," 
as  you  say  it  has,  "  in  all  ages  and  by  all  denomi- 
nations to  be  a  divinely  prescribed  term  of  commu- 
nion."* Others  may,  perhaps,  say  this  with  truth  ; 
but  neither  you,  nor  I,  nor  any  other  Baptist  can. 
When- you  say  that  baptism  has  been  held  by  all 
denominations  to  be  a  term  of  communion,  either 
you  are  no  Baptist,  or  your  assertion  is  not  true ; 
either  you  admit  affusion  and  aspersion  to  be  bap- 

*  Howell  on  Com.  p.  61. 


BAPTISM    NOT    A    TERM    OF    COMMUNION.        83 

tism  as  well  as  immersion,  and  so  falsify  your  own 
principles,  or  there  is  no  truth  in  your  statement ; 
for  a  professing  of  Christ  by  immersion — the 
thing  that  you  are  contending  for,  and  the  only 
thing  that  you  are  willing  to  admit  to  be 
baptism — has  not  been  held  by  all  denomina- 
tions to  be  necessary  to  communion.  If  you 
say  that  what  has  been  considered  baptism  by 
them  has  been  regarded  in  this  light,  I  have 
only  to  say  that  this  is  a  sophistical  use  of  a  word 
unworthy  of  a  cause  professing  to  be  based  upon 
the  truth.  In  contending  that  baptism  is  a  term 
of  communion,  you  never  mean  that  a  person 
must  have  received  either  immersion,  aspersion, 
or  affusion,  before  he  can  come  to  the  Lord's  table, 
but  that  he  must  be  an  immersed  believer.  What 
truth  is  there,  then,  in  the  declaration  that  "  bap- 
tism is  regarded  by  all  denominations  as  a  term 
of  communion  ?"  coming,  I  say,  from  you  who 
admit  nothing  to  be  baptism  where  there  is  no 
immersion.  None  whatever ;  and  your  appeal  to 
the  voice  of  the  Christian  church  is  a  suicidal 
one.  In  no  age  and  by  no  denomination,  except 
the  close-communion  Baptists  of  modern  times, 
has  the  want  of  an  immersional  profession  of 
Christianity  been  considered  a  barrier  to  the  Lord's 
table.  And,  as  I  showed  in  the  beginning  of  my 
last  letter,  even  you  yourself,  in  common  with  the 


84  OPEN    COMMUNION. 

denomination,  hold  that  in  certain  cases  baptism 
is  not  necessary  to  communion  :  for  you  say  that 
Pedobaptists  are  entitled  to  the  Lord's  supper  and 
qualified  for  communing,  provided  they  do  it 
among  themselves, — a  remark,  however,  which  you 
cannot  make  respecting  individuals  who  make  no 
professions  to  Christianity.  This  appeal  of  yours, 
my  dear  sir,  proves  not  only  that  the  voice  and 
practice  of  other  denominations,  but  that  your  own 
concessions  are  against  you.  It  shows,  not  that  I, 
but  that  you,  and  those  who  agree  with  you,  are 
the  ones  who,  in  this  matter,  stand  alone. 

Nor  is  your  reference  to  the  apostolic  commis- 
sion to  much  better  purpose.  "  The  commission," 
you  say,  "  clearly  indicates  that  baptism  preceded 
the  Lord's  supper,  and  is  prerequisite  to  it."*  But 
here  again  you  beg  the  entire  question,  assuming 
that  if  young  converts  are  to  be  baptized  before 
they  come  to  the  table  of  the  Lord,  therefore  un- 
immersed  professing  Christians  must  be.  You 
argue  that  because  the  commission  enjoins  the 
duty  of  baptizing  such  as  are  brought  to  a  saving 
knowledge  of  the  truth,  and  then  of  going  on 
with  them  and  teaching  them  to  observe  all 
Christ's  requirements,  therefore  before  they  can 
teach  their  fellow  disciples  whose  discipleship  may 

*  Taylor,  Bapt.  a  Term  of  Com. 


BAPTISM    NOT    A    TERM    OF    COMMUNION.         85 

not  have  been  entered  upon  by  immersion,  to 
observe  the  Lord's  supper,  they  must  see  to  it  that 
those  disciples  are  not  without  Christian  baptism. 
But  a  more  illogical  conclusion  it  would  be  diffi- 
cult to  draw.  If  the  commission  requires  us  to 
see  that  believers  are  invariably  immersed  before 
they  observe  the  supper,  it  requires  us  also  to  see 
that  they  are  immersed  before  they  observe  any 
other  of  the  "all  things"  that  Christ  has  com- 
manded. But,  as  you  yourself  admit,  it  does  ndt 
limit  us  to  the  immersed  as  the  individuals  whom 
we  are  to  instruct  in  the  observance  of  other  com- 
mands. How,  then,  either  directly  or  indirectly,  can 
it  limit  us  to  such  persons  as  the  only  ones  whom 
we  are  to  teach  to  observe  the  command  "  This  do 
in  remembrance  of  me,"  when  this  is  bound  up  in 
the  same  bundle  with  all  other  commands  enjoined 
upon  Christians  ?  The  commission  contains  not 
the  remotest  allusion  to  the  idea  that  we  are  not 
to  sanction  or  encourage  unbaptized  persons  in  ob- 
serving the  supper,  if  there  should  happen  to  be 
any  such  among  us  who  really  regarded  them- 
selves baptized,  and  whose  want  of  baptism  argued 
nothing  whatever  against  their  piety,  zeal,  or  faith- 
fulness to  their  Master.  It  affords  no  evidence 
whatever  that  the  supper  is  never  to  be  eaten  but 
by  believers  as  baptized  persons — a  view  which  it 
must  teach  in  order  to  sustain  the  idea  that  bap- 
8 


86  OPEN    COftMtTKIOffrf 

tism  is  a  divinely  required  qualification  for  com- 
munion, It  simply  requires  the  commissioned 
servants  of  Christ,  after  having  baptized  such  as 
they  have  discipled,  to  instruct  them  fully  in  the 
mind  and  will  of  their  Master,  and  to  teach  them 
to  observe  all  his  injunctions.  As  to  professing 
Christians  who  maybe  without  Christian  baptism, 
as  these  very  disciples  were  to  whom  the  commis- 
sion was  originally  given,  it  is  necessarily  silent^ 
for  it  relates  to  those  whom  we  disciple  and  intro- 
duce into  the  Christian  church,  and  not  to  those 
whom  we  find  already  in  it.  This  appeal,  there-* 
fore,  to  the  commission  in  support  of  your  views, 
is  wholly  irrelevant.  And  it  is  as  absurd  as  it  is 
irrelevant;  for  it  assumes  that  an  injunction  to 
instruct,  in  the  observance  of  whatever  Christ  has 
enjoined,  those  whom  we  have  discipled  and  bapj 
tized,  is  tantamount  to  an  injunction  not  to  sanction 
an  observance  of  the  Lord's  supper  by  such  as 
may  be  without  Christian  baptism,  even  though 
they  are  Christ's  acknowledged  disciples  and  fully 
recognised  as  such  under  all  other  circumstances. 
Another  of  your  reasons  for  regarding  baptism 
a  sine  qua  non  for  communion,  you  find  in  the 
practice  of  the  apostles  on  the  day  of  Pentecost 
and  after.  "The  apostles,"  you  say,  "first 
preached  ;  secondly,  the  people  believed  ;  thirdly, 
they  that  believed  were  baptized  ;  fourthly,  they 


BAPTISM    NOT    A    TERM    OF    COMMUNION.        87 

that  gladly  received  the  word  and  were  baptized 
continued  steadfastly  in  the  apostles'  doctrine,  and 
fellowship,  and  in  breaking  of  bread,  and  in 
prayers.  When  the  people  of  Samaria  believed 
Philip  preaching  the  things  pertaining  to  the 
kingdom  of  God,  they  were  not  received  imme- 
diately to  the  communion,  but  were  first  baptized. 
And  when  the  Holy  Ghost  fell  on  the  Gentile 
converts  at  Cassarea,  evincing  to  the  apostles  that 
God  had  accepted  them,  Peter  commanded  them 
to  be  baptized.  In  no  instance,  until  they  had 
submitted  to  baptism,  were  the  disciples  ever  per- 
mitted to  approach  the  holy  table."*  And  there- 
fore you  conclude  that  baptism  is  indispensable  to 
breaking  bread  ;  or  that  the  want  of  it  is  a  divinely 
prescribed  barrier  to  free  communion. 

But  to  say  nothing  of  the  fact  which  I  have 
already  proved,  that  the  primitive  disciples,  and 
even  the  Lord  himself,  did  commune  with  such  as 
had  never  received  Christian  baptism,  what  does 
all  this  display  of  yours  amount  to  ?  It  assumes 
that  the  question  in  debate  is,  whether  or  not 
young  converts  shall  be  admitted  to  the  Lord's 
table  previous  to  their  making  an  acknowledged 
profession  of  Christianity  ;  which  is  not  the  question 
at  all.    So  far  as  the  real  point  at  issue  is  concerned, 

*  Howell  on  Com.  pp.  44,  45. 


88  OPEN    COMMUNION. 

it  proves  nothing.  It  simply  shows  that  the  apos- 
tles, as  free  communionists  do,  after  having  received 
their  converts  into  the  visible  Christian  body,  com- 
muned with  them.  Farther  than  this,  all  this 
show  of  argument  amounts  to  nothing. 

Or,  if  it  proves  anything  in  favor  of  your  posi- 
tion, it  proves  too  much.  If  it  demonstrates  that 
baptism  is  indispensable  to  Christians'  approaching 
the  Lord's  table  aright,  it  demonstrates  also  that 
it  is  necessary  to  their  constancy  in  attending  upon 
the  teachings  of  Christ,  the  prophets,  and  the 
apostles ;  to  continuance  in  Christian  fellowship 
and  engagement  in  prayers  one  with  another.  It 
proves  that  it  is  an  indispensable  condition  to 
rejoicing  in  believing,  to  eating  an  ordinary  meal, 
and  to  acts  of  hospitality.  For  we  read  that  they 
that  gladly  received  the  word  and  were  baptized, 
continued  steadfast  upon  the  teachings  of  the  apos- 
tles, and  in  fellowship,  and  in  prayers,  as  well  as 
in  breaking  bread  ;*  that  the  Ethiopian  eunuch, 
after  his  baptism,  went  on  his  way  rejoicing  ;\ 
that  the  Philippian  jailor  and  his  family,  after 
hearing  the  word,  were  first  baptized  ;  then,  when 
he  had  brought  Paul  and  Silas  back  again  into 
his  house,  he  set  meat  before  them  and  rejoiced, 
believing  in  God  ;J  that  Paul,  on  being  restored 

*  Acts  ii.  42.         f  Acts  yiii.  39.        \  Acts  xvL  li> 


BAPTISM    NOT    A    TERM    OF    COMMUNION.         SO 

from  his  blindness  after  his  conversion,  arose  and 
was  baptized,  then  received  meat  and  ivas  strength- 
ened ;*  that  Peter  commanded  those  who  had 
received  the  Holy  Ghost  under  his  preaching  at 
Caesarea  to  be  baptized  ;  after  which  they  prayed 
him  to  tarry  certain  days  ;f  that  Lydia  attended 
to  the  things  spoken  by  Paul ;  and  when  she  was 
baptized,  she  besought  him  and  his  companions  to 
make  her  house  their  home\  In  no  instance  do 
we  read  of  the  converts  to  Christianity,  under  the 
apostles,  ever  continuing  steadfast  in  their  attend- 
ance upon  the  teaching  of  their  instructors,  in 
Christian  fellowship  (or  the  having  of  things  in 
common,  or  the  making  of  joint  contributions  for 
the  gospel's  sake,  as  the  case  may  have  been),  and 
in  prayers;  or  of  their  rejoicing,  eating  an  ordinary 
meal,  or  performing  the  rites  of  hospitality,  till 
after  they  had  been  baptized.  If  this  sort  of  argu- 
ment proves  that  baptism  is  indispensable  to  com- 
munion, it  proves  that  it  is  indispensable,  too,  to 
engaging  in  these  other  duties  and  exercises  aright. 
If,  therefore,  your  position  and  practice  are  called 
for  by  apostolic  precedent,  consistency  requires 
you  to  maintain  likewise  that  no  Christian  has 
any  right  to  continue  steadfast  in  reading  the 
Word  of  God,  in  attending  the  sanctuary  in  fel- 

*  Actsix.  18, 19.     f  Acts  x.  48.     %  Acts  xiv.  14,  15. 
8* 


90  OPEN    COMMUNION. 

lowshiping  with  Christian*,  in  contributing  to 
benevolent  objects,  and  in  prayer,  or  to  rejoice  in 
God,  to  entertain  his  brethren,  or  to  eat  another 
meal,  till  he  is  immersed  I  There  is  no  possible 
half-way  ground  between  the  two.  Nor  is  there 
any  more  absurdity  or  Puseyism  in  the  latter  con- 
clusion than  the  former. 

Again  you  say  that  the  signification  of  the  two 
ordinances  proves  baptism  to  be  prerequisite  to 
the  supper ;  that  baptism  is  emblematic  of  a  new 
birth  and  the  supper  of  the  constant  nourishment 
which  the  new  life  demands;  that  "the  metapho- 
rical representation,  therefore,  requires  that  bap- 
tism should  always  be  received  as  a  condition  of 
communion  ;"*  and  that,  "  it  is  preposterous  to 
place  the  new  life  and  its  nourishment  before  the 
new  birth  in  which  that  new  life  began."f  But  I 
confess  I  am  unable  to  see  the  relevancy  of  this 
reasoning.  It  assumes,  what  you  are  continually 
assuming,  but  what  is  not  true,  that  open  com- 
munionists  teach  that  the  supper  may  be  eaten 
by  young  converts  as  the  first  act  of  visible  disci- 
pleship.  Moreover  it  makes  baptism  regenerative  ; 
otherwise  how  are  "  the  new  life  and  its  nourish- 
ment placed  before  the  new  birth"  by  the  com- 

*  Howell  on  Com.,  p.  47. 

f  R.  Fuller  on  Bapt.  and  Com.,  p.  189. 


BAPTISM    NOT    A   TERM    OF    COMMUNION.        91 

munion  of  unbaptized  persons?  Is  baptism  ne- 
cessary in  order  to  that  birth  ?  Is  it  necessary  in 
order  to  indicate  such  a  birth  ?  If  not,  where  is 
the  force  of  your  reasoning  ?  Is  it  true  that  the 
life,  represented  in  communion  as  possessed  by  the 
communicant,  is  not  possessed  by  him  unless  he 
has  been  previously  baptized  ?  If  not,  where  is 
the  necessity  of  baptism  previous  to  an  act  which 
is  not  a  profession  of  baptism,  but  of  discipleship 
and  faith  and  love  ?  I  say,  communion  is  not  a 
profession  of  baptism.  In  other  words,  it  is  not  a 
symbol  of  an  immersional  profession  of  disciple- 
ship. It  was  not  in  the  case  of  the  eleven  at  the 
institution  of  the  supper.  It  was  not  with  primi- 
tive disciples  on  subsequent  occasions.  JSor  is  it 
now.  If  communion  were  a  profession  of  bap- 
tism, as  baptism  is  of  faith,  of  course  it  would 
require  baptism  to  precede  it,  or  its  symbolical 
character  would  be  falsified.  But  as  such  is  not  the 
case,  your  appeal  to  the  emblematic  import  of  the 
ordinances  amounts  to  nothing. 

The  last  reason  you  give  is,  that  circumcision 
was  a  prerequisite  to  the  passover,  and  the  ana- 
logy requires  that  baptism  should  be  to  the  Lord's 
supper.  You  say,  with  Mr.  Booth,  "  I  take  it  for 
granted  that  circumcision  was  absolutely  neces- 
sary for  every  male  in  order  to  communion  at  the 
paschal  supper  and  in  the  solemn  worship  of  the 


92  OPEN    COMMUNION. 

sanctuary.  If  this  be  allowed,  the  consequence  is 
plain  and  the  argument,  though  analogical,  is  irref- 
ragable ;  for  the  paschal  feast  and  sanctuary  ser- 
vices were  not  more  of  a  positive  nature  than  the 
Lord's  supper,  nor  were  the  former  more  peculiar 
to  that  dispensation  than  the  latter  is  to  this."* 

To  this  it  is  sufficient  to  say,  that,  while  sound 
analogical  arguments  are  irrefragable,  in  this  case 
the  analogies  are  very  far  from  holding  good. 
Circumcision  was  made  a  prerequisite  to  the 
passover  by  an  express  law.  "  No  uncircumcised 
person  shall  eat  thereof."f  But  no  such  connex- 
ion is  established  between  baptism  and  the  supper. 
There  is  no  law,  as  you  acknowledge,  prohibiting 
unbaptized  persons  from  communing.  It  is  of  no 
avail  for  you,  while  you  make  this  admission,  to 
undertake  to  show  why  unbaptized  persons  are 
not  prohibited.  Turn  it  and  twist  it  as  you  will, 
it  is  still  true  that  such  persons  did  commune  in 
the  Savior's  time,  and  that  there  never  was  issued 
any  command  for  them  not  to  commune,  unless, 
forsooth,  it  is  found  in  the  injunction,  "This  do  in 
remembrance  of  me." 

But  there  is  also  another,  and  a  no  less  import- 
ant point  in  which  the  analogy  is  wanting.  You 
make  baptism,  in  this  argument,  analogous  to  cir- 

*  Vindication,  sect  v.  f  Exod.  xil  48. 


BAPTISM    NOT    A   TERM    OF    COMMUNION.        93 

cumcision.  But  Paul  teaches  that  the  circumcision 
of  the  Abrahamic  covenant  symbolizes,  not  baptism, 
but  "  the  putting  off  of  the  body  of  the  sins  of  the 
flesh,"  that  circumcision  which,  to  every  child  of 
God,  is  the  token  of  his  being  within  the  covenant 
made  by  the  Father  to  Christ,  the  antitype  of 
Abraham.  For  as  a  man  carried  the  token  of  his 
being  a  member  of  God's  ancient  covenant  people 
by  being  circumcised  in  the  flesh ;  so  an  individual 
is  marked  as  a  spiritual  Jew  or  a  believer  by  a  spi- 
ritual circumcision."*  The  analogy  requires,  there- 
fore, not  baptism,  but  sanctification,  as  the  prere- 
quisite corresponding  to  circumcision  as  a  pre- 
requisite to  the  passover.  And  your  argument 
should  run  thus  :  As  none  but  Jews,  or  members 
of  the  passed-over  nation,  could  truly  partake  of 
the  passover  in  commemoration  of  the  deliverance 
wrought  under  Moses  in  Egypt,  so  none  but  be- 
lievers can  feed  by  faith  on  Christ  crucified  in 
commemoration  of  the  deliverance  from  sin  and 
death  wrought  for  man  in  the  death  of  Christ,  the 
antitype  of  the  paschal  lamb  of  the  Israelites. 
And  inasmuch  as,  in  accordance  with  their  obvi- 
ous scriptural  design,  the  visible  church  and  its 
ordinances  of  baptism  and  the  supper  are  but  a 
visible  representation  of  the  invisible  church  and 

*  Col.  iL  11;  Rom.  ii.  28,  29. 


94  OPEN    COMMUNION. 

its  members*  acts  of  dying  to  sin  and  rising  in 
Christ  to  a  life  of  holiness,  and  of  living  by  faith 
upon  his  death  as  the  spiritual  food  of  their  souls; 
this  argument  teaches,  not  that  those  who  would 
partake  worthily  of  the  supper  be  baptized,  but 
that,  as  members  of  the  visible  church,  they  be 
spiritually  circumcised — identified  in  heart  with 
"  the  circumcision  who  worship  God  in  the  Spirit 
and  rejoice  in  Christ  Jesus  and  have  no  confidence 
in  the  flesh."  If  consistently  carried  out,  then,  the 
analogy  would  require  the  law  of  the  Lord's  sup- 
per to  be  this,  "  Let  no  unbeliever  partake  of  it." 
So  far  from  its  affording  an  evidence  of  the  indis- 
pensable prerequisiteness  of  baptism  to  commu- 
nion, it  has  no  bearing  upon  the  question  at  all. 

Such  are  the  reasons  you  and  others  assign  for 
regarding  baptism  a  divinely  prescribed  sine  qua 
non  for  communion.  But  a  man  of  your  good 
sense  must  see,  that  really  none  of  them  support 
the  idea,  whilst  several  of  them  testify  directly 
against  it.  The  position  that  the  want  of  baptism 
is  a  divinely  recognised  barrier  to  communion,  as 
though  the  Lord's  table  belonged  to  none  among 
us  but  the  immersed,  is  one  that  cannot  be  sus- 
tained. The  best  attempts  to  defend  it  only  show 
to  what  weaknesses  Christian  men  are  liable.  For, 
in  view  of  the  utter  irrelevancy  and  the  suicidal 
character  of  these  attempts,  how  ridiculously  dog- 


BAPTISM    NOf   A   *ERM    OF    COMMUNION.        OB 

inatic  and  painfully  destitute  of  truth  are  such 
asseverations  as  these  <  "  Christian  baptism  is  one 
of  the  divinely  ordained  and  unchangeable  terms 
of  communion."'*  "  In  the  apostles'  days  it  was 
constantly  required  as  a  preparation  for  the  com- 
munion."! "  God's  regulations  forbid  the  unbap- 
tized  [i.  e.  Pedobaptiets]  to  partake  of  the  .sup- 
per."]; "He  orders  that  the  baptized  only  shall 
communicate;  who  will  dare  to  abrogate  this 
order  ?"§  That  is,  God  orders  that  Pedobaptists, 
that  all  professing  Christians  who  have  not  made 
their  profession  by  immersion,  shall  not  com* 
memorate  their  Lord^s  death  !  If  this  is  not  teach- 
ing for  doctrines  the  commandments  of  men,  I 
know  not  what  is.  As  to  any  express  "  order"  to 
restrict  the  Lord's  supper  to  "  the  baptized  only," 
I  challenge  all  Christendom  to  produce  it.  It 
cannot  be  produced.  As  Mr.  Kinghorn  says,  "  the 
New  Testament  does  not  prohibit  the  unbaptized 
from  receiving  the  Lord's  supper."  And  what  is 
more  than  this,  neither  does  the  voice  of  the 
Christian  church,  nor  the  commission,  nor  the' 
practice  of  the  apostles,  nor  the  meaning  of  the 
ordinances,  nor  the  supposed  analogy  between  the 

*  Howell  on  Com.-  p.  50.  f  Ibid,  p.  45* 

X  R.  Fuller  on  Bapt.  and  Com.,,  p.  195, 
§  Ibid.  p.  198. 


9b  OPEN    COMMUNION. 

terms  of  admission  to  the  passover  and  the  terms 
of  communion,  afford  the  least  shadow  of  a  reason 
for  inferring  that  such  a  restriction  is  consonant 
with  the  mind  of  Christ,  but  the  contrary.  The 
apostles  and  primitive  Christians  were  obviously 
strangers  to  the  idea  that  the  supper  is  for  per- 
sons as  baptized  believers.  They  practised  on  the 
principle  that  it  is  the  Lord's  table  and  for  his 
disciples  as  such,  commemorating  his  love  and 
death.  If  there  were  any  with  whom  they  could 
not  commune,  evidently  it  was  not  their  unbap- 
tized  fellow-disciples  like  Peter,  James,  and  John, 
but  such  as  they  could  not  fellowship  as  Christians. 
And  those  with  whom  they  would  not  commune, 
if  there  were  any  such,  could  not  but  regard  their 
refusal  to  do  so  as  equivalent  to  a  refusal  to  ac- 
knowledge their  Christian  character.  Acting  on 
apostolic  principles,  not  only  are  we  not  at  liberty 
to  refrain,  but  we  cannot  have  the  wish  to  refrain, 
from  communing  with  any  who  stand  before  the 
world,  and  whom  we  acknowledge  as  credible  pro- 
fessing Christians.  If  we  decline  communing  with 
any,  it  must  be  because  we  cannot  regard  them  as 
members  of  the  common  Christian  brotherhood ;  a 
light  in  which  we  cannot  view  pious  Pedobaptists. 
In  the  erecting  of  anything  as  a  term  of  commu- 
nion which  causes  a  restriction  of  the  Lord's  sup- 
per from  them,  we  are  guilty  of  a  gross  mal- 


BAPTISM    NOT   A   TERM    OF    COMMUNION.        97 

administration  of  the  ordinance.  If  we  are  satis- 
fied that  an  individual  is  a  disciple  of  Christ,  the 
question  as  to  how  he  has  professed  Christ  is  one 
we  have  nothing  to  do  with  when  we  gather 
around  the  emblems  of  our  Savior's  body  to  com- 
memorate his  death.  So  long  as  it  is  a  stubborn 
fact  that  there  are  multitudes  of  holy  and  zealous 
Christians  who  differ  from  us  in  their  views  re- 
specting the  act  and  subjects  of  baptism,  and,  of 
course,  are  unbaptized  as  we  believe,  it  is  enough 
to  know  that  those  with  whom  we  engage  in  the 
solemn  ordinance  of  commemorating  the  Savior's 
death,  are  members  together  with  us  of  the  com- 
mon household  of  faith.  Nay  more;  I  consider  it 
unworthy  of  any  enlightened  mind,  and  beneath 
the  dignity  of  the  religion  of  Christ,  to  descend  at 
any  time,  much  more  at  such  a  time,  to  the  in- 
quiry how  a  disciple,  eminent  it  may  be  for  his 
piety  and  usefulness,  has  made  his  profession  of 
Christianity.  Such  a  course  ill  becomes  a  follower 
of  Christ. 

t    Yours,  as  ever,  in  all  sincerity,  &c 


LETTER  V. 

¥88    WANT    OF    BAPTISM    NOT    TltE    TRUE     GROUNT* 
UPON  WHIClt  RESTRICTED  COMMUNION  PROCEEDS. 

Close  communidnistS  require  something  more  than  re- 
pentance, faith,  and  baptism^^^ne  supper  made  a  de- 
nominational ordinance^-The  insincerity  of  Baptists—3 
Their  reasons  for  making  it  a  denominational  ordi-^ 
nance,  no  reasons— =Their  practice  inconsistent  with 
their  professions — 'The  foil y  of  Contending  for  baptism 
as  a  term  of  communion. 

My  Dear  Fr+end  J — I  have  addressed  you  in 
my  former  letters  as  though  you  really  acted  upon 
the  principle  that  repentance,  faith,  and  baptism 
Were  the  qualifications  for  communion,  which 
whoever  had,  might  come  to  the  Lord's  table.  But 
you  do  not  act  upon  this  principle ;  and  all  you 
say  about  the  necessity  of  baptism  to  Communion^ 
I  confess,  I  regard  as  nothing  better  than  dust  and 
smoke.  It  might  be  spared,  the  whole  of  it ;  for 
it  has  nothing  whatever  to  do  with  regulating  your 
administrations  of  the  Lord's  supper.  The  want 
of  baptism  is  not  the  trife  ground  upon  which  the 
restriction  you  practise,  proceeds ;  for  an  indivi- 
dual's being  an  immersed  and  consistent  Christian 


RESTRICTION,    NOT    FOR   WANT    OF    BAPTISM.   99 

is  no  evidence  whatever  that  he  may  be  allowed  a 
place  at  the  Lord's  table  with  you.  So  far  from 
considering  the  Lord's  supper  an  ordinance  for 
believers  as  baptized  persons,  as  you  profess  to 
consider  it,  you  make  it  a  denominational  affair 
altogether.  In  this,  however,  you  act  only  in  con- 
formity with  the  principles  and  practice  of  the 
denomination  ;  for  the  rules  of  close-communion 
churches,  the  United  States  over,  require  of  all 
communicants  something  more  than  repentance, 
faith,  baptism,  and  a  godly  walk  and  conversation  ; 
and  that  is,  that  they  be  members  of  some  church 
•  of  like  faith  and  order.  You  know  very  well  that 
the  immersed  members  of  the  Congregational, 
Presbyterian,  and  other  evangelical  denominations, 
immersed  it  may  be  by  Baptist  ministers,  are 
never  allowed  to  commune  in  close-communion 
churches ;  or  if  allowed,  it  is  only  in  violation  of 
their  rules.  It  was  simply  because  I  questioned 
the  propriety  of  this  course,  that  the  council  which 
met  in  the  autumn  of  1851  to  recognise  me  as 
pastor  of  the  church  at  Westport,  refused  to  do 
it.  They  had  examined  me  on  all  the  various 
points  on  which  it  is  customary  to  examine  on 
such  occasions — experimental  religion,  call  to  the 
ministry,  doctrinal  views,  church  polity  and  bap- 
tism. Apparently  only  one  question  more  re- 
mained to  be  asked.     It  was  this :  "  In  adminis- 


100  OPEN    COMMUNION. 

tering  the  Lord's  supper,  would  you  invite  to  it 
any  credible  Christians  who  are  baptized,  or  would 
you  restrict  your  invitations  to  such  as  are  mem- 
bers of  Baptist  churches  ?"  My  reply  was,  "  I 
would  invite  any  who  are  baptized  and  leading 
consistent  Christian  lives."  But  for  this  reply,  and 
because  I  was  unable,  after  all  that  was  said,  to 
see  the  impropriety  of  it,  the  council  refused  to 
install  me.  In  the  Congregational  and  Methodist 
churches  in  the  place,  there  were  several  immersed 
members  ;  and  if  I  had  been  allowed  to  extend  a 
general  invitation  to  all  baptized  persons,  these,  of 
course,  when  present,  would  have  been  included. 
But  this,  alas !  would  have  been  contrary  to  the 
traditions  of  the  elders !  The  course  pursued  by 
these  brethren  of  the  Essex  and  Champlain  Asso- 
ciation, is  the  very  course  that  Mr.  Remington 
defends  and  pleads  for.  In  proof  of  this,  take  the 
following  from  his  Defence  of  Restricted  Commu- 
nion :*  Rev.  Mr.  R.,  a  Methodist,  he  tells  us,  hap- 
pened to  be  present  on  a  certain  communion  occa- 
sion where  Mr.  C,  a  Baptist  minister,  officiated. 
As  the  church  were  about  to  proceed  to  the  ad- 
ministration of  the  supper,  said  Mr.  B.,  "I  should 
like,  if  agreeable,  to  commemorate  the  death  and 
sufferings  of  our  Lord  Jesus  Christ  with  you." 

*  P.  14,  15. 


RESTRICTION,  NOT  FOR  WANT  OF  BAPTISM.    101 

Mr.  C.  "  But,  my  brother,  you  must  be  baptized 
before  you  come  with  us  to  the  Lord's  table ;  and 
you  know  our  principles,  that  we  consider  no  bap- 
tism valid  but  immersion."  Mr.  R.  "  True ;  but 
I  have  been  immersed."  Mr.  C.  "  Let  me  inquire 
then,  my  brother,  do  you,  both  by  precept  and 
example,  sanction  immersion  as  the  only  gospel 
baptism  ?"  Mr.  R.  "  0,  no  sir !  I  believe  that 
sprinkling  and  pouring  are  either  valid  gospel 
baptism."  Mr.  C.  "  I  thought  so  ;  and  you  cer- 
tainly know  that  with  such  views  and  practice  we 
should  make  ourselves  very  inconsistent  to  admit 
you  to  the  communion  with  us."  Here  is  an  in- 
dividual who  is  refused  a  seat  at  the  Lord's  table, 
not  because  of  a  want  of  repentance,  faith,  or  bap- 
tism, but  because  he  differed  somewhat  from  his 
Baptist  brother  in  belief  respecting  baptism,  and, 
of  course,  in  practice  and  denominational  locality. 
This  Mr.  Remington  gives  as  an  illustration  of 
what  may  happen,  and  under  the  circumstances 
ought  to  happen,  in  any  close-communion  body  ; 
a  doctrine  which  the  American  Baptist  Publica- 
tion Society  endorse,  and  the  denomination  from 
Maine  to  California  act  upon.  Even  the  members 
of  Freewill  Baptist  churches,  you  know,  are  never 
invited,  and  never  would  be  communed  with,  if  it 
could  be  avoided.  But  it  is  not  for  want  of  repent- 
ance, faith,  and  baptism  ;  for  the  moment  a  Free- 
9* 


102  OPEN    COMMUNION. 

will  Baptist  joins  a  close-communion  church,  he  is 
no  longer  unqualified.  Nor  are  members  of  Cal- 
vinistic  open  Baptist  churches,  persons  like  Alex- 
ander Carson,  Baptist  W.  Noel,  and  a  large  share 
of  the  Baptists  in  England  and  Canada,  regarded 
by  "  regular "  Baptists,  like  yourself,  as  proper 
fellow  communicants.  You  say,  "We  cannot 
with  propriety  extend  an  invitation  to  those  Bap- 
tists who  practise  open  communion.  We  must 
limit  it  to  those  of  our  order."  And  so  say  all 
hearty  restricted  communionists,  who  never,  if 
possible,  allow  a  free-communion  Baptist  to  par- 
take of  the  Lord's  supper  with  them.*  Even 
Prof.  Curtis,  with  all  his  laboring  to  support  the 
idea  that  the  celebration  of  the  Lord's  supper  is 
intended  to  signify,  and  does  signify,  that  the  com- 
municants are  all  members  of  the  same  visible 
church,  and  that  the  eucharist  is  therefore  a  parti- 
cular-church ordinance,  shows  most  clearly  that  to 
his  own  mind  it  is  no  such  thing,  but  neither  more 
nor  less  than  a  denominational  ordinance.  This  is 
apparent  throughout  the  whole  volume.  For  your 
satisfaction,  however,  I  will  specify  two  or  three  of 
those  passages  in  which  this  is  most  obvious.  On 
page  108  he  says,  "We  take  our  stand  upon  this, 
that  if  the  Lord's  supper  is  a  church  ordinance, 

*  See  Judd's  Remains,  p.  351. 


RESTRICTION,  NOT  FOR  WANT  OF  BAPTISM.    103 

if  it  is  the  appointed  symbol  of  church  relations, 
it  should  only  be  celebrated  together  with  those 
with  whom  we  can  consistently  sustain  those  rela- 
tions." "  This,"  adds  a  friendly  pen,  "  is  one  of 
the  strong  positions  maintained  through  much  of 
the  able  argumentation  of  Mr.  Curtis  in  his  book  ;"* 
a  sentence  which,  if  it  were  not  known  to  be  put 
forth  in  all  seriousness,  and  by  a  friend,  might  be 
regarded  as  thrown  out  in  irony.  "Able  argu- 
mentation "  or  not,  however,  it  is  a  fair  specimen 
of  the  logic  and  the  conclusiveness  of  the  reason- 
ing that  runs  through  the  whole  volume.  It 
requires  no  very  great  penetration  of  mind  to  per- 
ceive that  a  symbol  of  what  is,  is  not  a  symbol  of 
what  may  or  can  be.  Mr.  C,  therefore,  on  the 
supposition  that  the  eucharist  is  "the  appointed 
symbol  of  church  relations,"  ought  not  to  argue 
that  it  should  be  celebrated  only  with  those  with 
whom  we  can  sustain,  but  with  those  with  whom 
we  do  sustain,  those  relations.  This,  however,  is 
a  closer  communion  than  he  advocates,  or  is  will- 
ing to  advocate.  His  idea  is  that  the  communion 
is  a  symbol  of  denominational  relations  existing 
between  the  communicants.  And  if  this  idea  were 
just,  the  conclusion  that  the  supper  should  only  be 
celebrated  together  by  those  who  can  consistently 

*  Christian  Review,  vol.  xvi.  p.  222. 


104  OPEN    COMMUNION. 

unite  in  particular-church  relations,  would  be  cor- 
rect. Such  a  conclusion  however,  you  perceive, 
cannot  be  arrived  at  from  his  premises.  Again 
he  says,  "  If  the  Lord's  supper  is  a  church  ordi- 
nance, and  indicates  a  church  fellowship  among  all 
those  who  partake  together,  it  is  a  violation  of 
truth  in  symbols  to  invite  to  occasional  commu- 
nion those  whom  our  constitutional  principles 
would  forbid  to  be  members  of  our  churches/'* 
As  this  sentence  stands  there  is  no  logic  in  it. 
But  if,  in  place  of  the  italicised  words  "  whom 
our  constitutional  principles  would  forbid  to  6e," 
we  read  "  who  are  not,"  the  conclusion  then 
arrived  at — that  it  would  be  unlawful  to  commune 
with  those  who  are  not  members  of  our  particular 
church — will  naturally  and  necessarily  follow  from 
Mr.  C.'s  premises.  But  this  is  not  the  conclusion 
to  which  he  would  come.  The  conclusion  to  which 
he  himself  comes — that  we  may  invite  to  occa- 
sional communion  those  whom  our  constitutional 
principles  would  not  forbid  to  be  members  of  our 
church — is  just  the  one  to  which  he  wishes  to  come. 
This  shows  that  his  premises  are  at  fault.  And  they 
can  be  rectified  only  by  substituting  "denomination- 
al ordinance,"  and  "  denominational  fellowship  " 
in  place  of  the  expressions  "  church  ordinance  " 
and  "  church  fellowship."     For  example :  "  If  the 

*  P.  HI. 


RESTRICTION,  NOT  FOR  WANT  OF  BAPTISM.    105 

Lord's  supper  is  a  denominational  ordinance  and 
indicates  a  denominational  fellowship  among  all 
those  who  partake  together,  it  is  a  violation  of 
truth  in  symbols  to  invite  to  occasional  communion 
those  whom  our  constitutional  principles  forbid  to 
be  members  of  our  church ;"  that  is,  such  as  are 
not  in  our  denomination.  As  this  conclusion  is 
the  one  to  which  Prof.  C.  would  come,  but  one 
that  cannot  be  drawn  from  his  premises  or  from 
any  other  than  the  position  that  the  supper  is  a 
symbol  of  denominational  relations,  it  shows  that 
his  idea  is,  in  fact,  that  it  is  a  denominational 
ordinance.  This  is  more  palpable,  perhaps,  in  the 
following  sentences:  "All  that  our  course,  in 
declining  to  celebrate  with  members  of  other  deno- 
minatio?is7  exhibits,  is  that  such  persons  do  not 
belong  to  churches  of  our  order  ;"  that  is,  to  our 
denomination.*  "  We  do  not  own  them  as  Bap- 
tists."! And  in  referring  to  the  Methodists  and 
their  love-feast,  he  says,  "  We  do  not  feel  their 
regulation  as  to  this  feast  the  least  infringement 
upon  Christian  charity  or  fellowship,  because  the 
love-feast  is  intended  only  for  the  members  of  their 
own  churches.  We  only  do  not  see  why  they  can- 
not at  least  allow  us  to  take  the  same  view  of  the 
supper."];     The  whole  volume  shows,  that,  while 

*  P.  lit.  f  P.  237.  X  P.  110. 


106  OPEN    COMMUNION. 

lie  theorizes  about  a  particular-church  ordinance, 
his  conclusions,  like  his  practical  administrations  of 
the  institution  and  his  invitations  to  it,  make  it,  in 
reality,  a  denominational  affair.  And  so  it  is  with 
the  denomination  from  one  end  of  the  country  to 
the  other.  Their  invitations  are  always  restricted. 
to  members  of  "sister  churches,"  which,  in  the 
mouth  of  a  close  communionist,  you  know,  always 
means  members  of  close  Baptist  churches.  It  mat- 
ters not  what  or  how  many  other  baptized  Chris- 
tians may  be  present,  none  but  close  communion- 
ists  are  included  in  the  invitation.  The  adminis- 
tration of  the  supper  is  designed  to  be  restricted 
from  all  others,  and  any  departure  from  this  rule 
is  regarded  an  irregularity  worthy  of  censure,  and, 
if  unrepented  of  or  persisted  in,  worthy  of  disci- 
pline even  to  excommunication. 

And  yet,  when  asked  whether  this  is  not  the 
Lord's  table,  you  say,  "  0  yes !  and  this  is  the 
very  reason  why  we  dare  not  admit  those  who 
have  not  the  prerequisites  which  the  Lord  re- 
quires ;  were  it  our  table,  we  would  give  vent  to 
our  feelings  and  joyfully  invite  our  brethren." 
This  is  the  language  of  every  apologist  for  re- 
stricted communion.*    But  how  much  sincerity  is 

*See  Cone's  "Terras  of  Com."  R.  Fuller  on  Bapt 
and  Com.,  p.  197.     Howell  on  Com.,  p.  107. 


RESTRICTION,  NOT  FOR  WANT  OF  BAPTISM.    107 

there  in  it  ?  If  repentance,  faith,  and  baptism  are 
"  the  prerequisites  which  the  Lord  requires,"  why- 
make  any  distinction  among  such  as  have  these 
prerequisites  ?  Why  invite  to  the  Lord's  table 
close  communionists  only  ?  Why  decline  com* 
munion  with  Freewill  and  other  open-communion 
Baptists  and  with  baptized  members  of  other 
churches  ?  The  answer  is  not  found  in  the  reply 
that  they  have  never  repented  from  dead  works, 
believed  on  Christ,  or  been  baptized.  But  it  lies 
in  the  fact  that  though  they  may  not  be  destitute 
of  "  the  scriptural  prerequisites,"  they  have  not 
the  prerequisites  we  require;  that  is,  they  are  not 
close  communionists  {  though  they  may  be  mem* 
bers  of  the  church  of  Christ,  they  belong  not  to 
our  denomination  ;  though  they  may  be  entitled 
to  a  place  at  his  table,  they  cannot  come  to  ours, 

I  know  you  attempt  to  justify  this  course  by 
saying  that  communion  with  baptized  Chris* 
tians  not  members  of  what  you  are  pleased  to 
call  regular  Baptist  churches,  is  an  irregularity 
not  consistent  with  gospel  order.  But,  pray, 
where's  your  proof  for  this  ?  Do  you  think  that 
Philip  and  the  apostles  would  not  have  admitted 
the  Ethiopian  eunuch — a  member  of  no  close- 
communion  church,  as  you  yourself  admit"' — to 

*  See  A.  Fuller,  Works,  vol.  iii.  p.  512.  R5  Fuller  on 
Bapt.  and  Com,,  pp*  146,  147. 


108  OPEN    COMMUNION. 

the  Lord's  table  ?  What  is  there  in  close-com- 
munion churches  that  renders  them  alone,  above 
all  others,  deserving  of  the  appellation  "  churches 
in  gospel  order  ?"  So  far  as  they  are  organiza- 
tions they  are  not  in  gospel  order,  or  rather  they 
are  not  gospel  or  New  Testament  churches ;  and 
so  far  as  they  are  close  communionists  and  party 
communionists,  they  are  still  farther  removed  from 
anything  that  is  sanctioned  in  the  Word  of  God. 
According  to  your  views,  the  whole  apostolic 
church,  which  consisted  of  no  organizations,  much 
less  of  close-communion  organizations,  must  have 
been  a  community  of  disorderly  walkers  from 
whom  all  good  Christians — all  regular  Baptists — 
were  commanded  to  withdraw  !  A  very  sad  state 
of  things  indeed ! 

But  you  ask,  "  Does  not  the  apostle  write  to 
the  Colossians  of  his  joying  and  beholding  their 
order  and  the  steadfastness  of  their  faith  ?  Does 
he  not  praise  the  Corinthians  for  keeping  the  ordi- 
nances as  they  had  been  delivered  to  them  ? 
Does  he  not  command  us  to  withdraw  from  all 
that  walk  disorderly  F  But  what  has  this  to  do 
with  justifying  your  mode  of  administering  the 
Lord's  supper  ?  His  reference  in  the  first  of  these 
passages*  is  not  to  order  in  the  sense  in  which 

*  Col.  il  5. 


RESTRICTION,  NOT  FOR  WANT  OF  BAPTISM.     109 

you  use  the  word  when  you  speak  of  churches  of 
our  order,  but  to  well-ordered  Christian  lives. 
Any  professing  Christians  who  are  leading  such 
lives,  whether  in  Baptist  churches  or  not,  are  in 
the  church  in  gospel  order  ;  that  is  to  say,  they 
are  members  of  the  Christian  church  and  walking 
orderly  in  the  gospel  sense  of  the  word.  Upon 
your  own  ground,  therefore — the  ground  that  the 
Lord's  supper  is  for  the  church  in  gospel  order — 
you  must  either  be  a  free  communionist,  or  give 
to  the  language  of  Scripture  an  unwarranted  sig- 
nification. 

As  to  1  Cor.  xi.  2  ;  you  are  continually  ringing 
the  changes  upon  it ;  but  it  is  not  for  the  correct 
administration  of  baptism  or  the  proper  observance 
of  the  supper,  that  the  apostle  here  praises  the 
Corinthians.  Of  this  a  bare  glance  at  the  original 
will  satisfy  you.  Or  take  Dr.  Kendrick's  transla- 
tion which  gives  the  apostle's  idea  very  well.  "  I 
praise  you,  brethren,  that  ye  remember  me  in  all 
things  and  hold  fast  the  precepts  which  I  delivered 
to  you."  Eespecting  the  manner  in  which  they 
professed  to  keep  the  Lord's  supper,  the  apostle 
says  in  the  17th  verse  of  this  very  chapter,  "I 
praise  you  not."  This  ordinance  they  obviously 
did  not  keep  as  it  should  be  kept.  Look  at  the 
20th  and  21st  verses.  "  When  ye  come  together 
into  one  place,  this  is  not  to  eat  the  Lord's  supper," 
10 


110  OPEN    COMMUNION. 

though  ye  profess  such  to  be  }rour  object ;  "  for  in 
eating,  every  one  taketh  before  other  his  own 
supper;"  he  anticipates  his  brethren  and  becomes 
drunken,  instead  of  tarrying  for  them,  while  they 
are  left  without  anything  to  eat  or  drink,  when 
they  come.  Was  this  "keeping  the  ordinance"  of 
the  eucharist  as  the  apostle  may  be  supposed  to 
have  delivered  it  to  them  ?  No.  Hence  his 
censure,  "  I  praise  you  not."  But  respecting  the 
instructions  which  he  had  previously  given  them, 
he  could  praise  them  for  adhering  to  them.  The 
passage  has  not  the  remotest  reference  to  the 
order  and  manner  of  observing  the  Christian  ordi- 
nances, but  simply  to  their  remembering  the  apos- 
tle in  all  things  and  desiring  to  carry  out  his 
instructions,  as  was  manifest  by  their  writing  to 
him  for  advice.  There  is,  therefore,  no  truth  in 
your  conclusion  that  the  churches  are  here  com- 
mended for  keeping  the  ordinances  of  baptism 
and  the  supper  as  they  were  delivered,  and  cen- 
sured for  deviating  from  the  example  and  teaching 
of  the  apostles.  Even  if  this  were  the  scope  of 
the  verse,  it  could  not  bear  against  open  com- 
munionists  as  such ;  for  it  is  not  they,  but  you, 
who  deviate  from  the  example  of  the  apostles,  not 
merely  in  withholding  the  supper  from  those  of 
their  fellow  disciples  whose  profession  has  not 
been  made  by   immersion,  but  in  restricting  it 


RESTRICTION,  NOT  FOR  WANT  OF  BAPTISM.     Ill 

from   many   whose    profession   has   been    made 
thus. 

Then  as  to  the  disorderly  walking  of  which  the 
apostle  speaks  in  2  Thess.  hi.  6,  you  assume  that 
it  is  a  want  of  membership  in  some  "regular" 
Baptist  church.  13ut  how  absurd  !  Even  suppos- 
ing Paul  had  known  anything  of  close-commu- 
nion organizations,  who  can  believe  that  he  would 
ever  have  swerved  so  far  from  himself,  as  to  pro- 
nounce all  who  were  not  members  of  such  bodies, 
disorderly  walkers?  The  entire  context  teaches 
plainly  enough  that  he  refers  to  the  leading  of  an 
idle  and  dissolute  life,  a  life  opposed  to  that  allud- 
ed to  in  Col.  ii.  5,  just  noticed.  "  We  command 
you,  brethren,  in  the  name  of  our  Lord  Jesus 
Christ,  that  ye  withdraw  yourselves  from  every 
brother  that  walketh  disorderly,  and  not  after  the 
tradition  (or  instructions)  which  he  received  of  us. 
For  yourselves  know  how  ye  ought  to  follow  us ; 
for  we  behaved  not  ourselves  disorderly  among 
you.  .  .  .  For  even  when  we  were  with  you,  this 
we  commanded  you,  that  if  any  would  not  work, 
neither  should  he  eat.  For  we  hear  that  there  are 
some  which  walk  among  you  disorderly,  working 
not  at  all,  but  are  busy-bodies,"  &c.  The  "  disor- 
derly" here  are  the  same  as  the  "unruly"  in  1 
Thess.  v.  14, — "  warn  them  that  are  unruly" — and 
denotes  such  as  are  refractory,  contumacious,  dis- 


112  OPEN    COMMUNION. 

solute,  disorderly  in  life  and  conduct.  Where 
any  are  thus  disorderly,  we  are  commanded  to 
withdraw  from  them,  not  only  in  sacramental 
communion,  but  in  everything  else,  expressive  of 
fellowship,  as  members  of  the  household  of  faith. 
The  injunction,  of  course,  reaches  to  all  professing 
Christians,  wherever  we  are  brought  into  eontact 
with  them ;  but  it  was  originally  addressed  to  a 
particular  body  of  Christians,  the  church  of  the 
Thessalonians,  respecting  their  conduct  one  toward 
another,  and  not  toward  members  of  other  churches. 
"  We  hear  that  there  are  some  which  walk  among 
you  disorderly.  .  .  .  Note  them  and  have  no  com- 
pany with  them."  Disorderly  walkers  in  your 
own  church,  then,  are  the  persons  you  are  here 
more  especially  commanded  to  withdraw  from ;  not 
pious  members  of  other  churches  and  denomina- 
tions. The  passage  has  nothing  to  do  with  any 
Christians  of  irreproachable  walk  and  conversa- 
tion. And  when  urged,  as  you  urge  it,  in  sup- 
port of  restricting  the  administration  of  the  Lord's 
supper  to  members  of  close  Baptist  churches,  it  is 
most  sadly  out  of  place. 

But,  if  the  Lord's  supper  be  really  a  denomina- 
tional ordinance,  as  you  would  have  it,  why  all  the 
ado  that  you  make  about  baptism  as  being  a 
term  of  communion  ?  Where  is  the  force  of  it, 
when  a  believer's  qualifiedness  turns  not  on  the 


RESTRICTION,  NOT  FOR  WANT  OF  BAPTISM.     113 

question,  "  Has  he  been  baptized  ?"  but  on  the 
question,  "  Is  he  a  member  of  some  sister  church 
of  like  faith  and  order  ?"  The  practice  that  re- 
stricts the  Lord's  supper  from  any  baptized  be- 
liever of  irreproachable  life,  is  an  open  abandon- 
ment of  the  ground  on  which  you  and  all  re- 
stricted communionists  profess  to  act.  Dr.  Howell, 
for  example,  the  great  American  champion  of  the 
system,  lays  it  down,  in  language  that  admits  of 
no  ambiguity,  that  "  repentance  toward  God,  faith 
in  our  Lord  Jesus  Christ,  and  baptism  in  the  name 
of  the  holy  Trinity,  are  incontrovertibly  the  terms 
of  communion,  appointed  and  established  by  the 
King  in  Zion,  and  from  which  we  are  forbidden, 
by  the  most  sacred  obligations,  at  any  time,  for 

ANY  PURPOSE,  OR  UNDER  ANY  CIRCUMSTANCE,  TO 

depart.  '  What  thing  soever  I  command  you,' 
saith  the  Lord  Jehovah,  '  observe  to  do  it.  Thou 
shalt  not  add  thereto,  nor  diminish  from  it  V  " 
Again,  "Repentance  toward  God,  faith  in  our 
Lord  Jesus  Christ,  and  baptism  in  the  name  of  the 
Father,  and  of  the  Son,  and  of  the  Holy  Ghost, 
are  indispensable  terms  of  approach  to  the  Lord's 
table,  and  to  which  those  who  have  observed 

THESE  PRELIMINARIES  CANNOT  AFTERWARDS  BE  DE- 
BARRED OF  ACCESS,  BUT  IN  CONSEQUENCE  OF  A 
FORFEITURE    OF    CHRISTIAN    CHARACTER,    BY    IMMO- 

10* 


114  OPEN    COMMUNION. 

rality  or  heresy."*  This  is  language  which  strikes 
a  death  blow  at  the  restriction  you  practise.  And 
remember  that  it  is  not  merely  the  language  of 
Dr.  Howell,  but  of  the  American  Baptist  Publica- 
tion Society,  by  whom  the  work  is  endorsed  and 
issued.  And  yet,  neither  is  Dr.  Howell,  nor  are 
the  members  of  the  Publication  Society,  nor  are 
our  brethren  generally,  regulated  in  their  practice 
by  this  rule,  any  more  than  you  yourself  are.  The 
restricted  communion  of  Baptist  churches,  the 
United  States  over,  makes  neither  more  nor  less 
than  membership  in  churches  of  like  faith  and 
order,  the  qualification  for  communion  with  them. 
Apologize  for  it,  and  seek  to  vindicate  it  as  much 
as  you  may,  still  the  fact  remains  the  same,  and  it 
cannot  be  denied  that  this  is  what  is  really  made 
the  one  and  all-embracing  prerequisite  for  a  seat 
at  the  Lord's  table,  by  the  "regular"  Baptists  in 
this  country.  Such  being  the  case,  to  what  pur- 
pose, I  say,  is  all  this  verbiage  about  "  repentance, 
faith,  and  baptism  being  the  divinely  ordained  and 
unchangeable  terms  of  communion,"  as  Dr.  How- 
ell expresses  it  ?  Why  not  at  once  deny  the  sacra- 
mental table  to  be  the  Lord's,  and  honestly  and 
avowedly  contend  for  its  being  a  denominational 
table  ?     If  it  be  true,  as  the  practice  of  restricted 

*  On  Com.,  pp.  102,  266. 


RESTRICTION,  NOT  FOR  WANT  OF  BAPTISM.     115 

communion  from  one  end  of  the  land  to  the  other 
says,  that  the  qualification  for  communion  is  not 
repentance,  faith,  and  baptism  merely,  but  simply 
a  place  in  the  Baptist  denomination,  then  let  us 
hear  no  more  about  not  communing  with  others, 
on  the  ground  of  their  not  being  baptized.  For 
the  truth's  sake,  let  us  have  consistency  and 
honesty.  Let  it  be  frankly  and  fearlessly  asserted 
that  the  communion  table  is  not  the  Lord's,  nor  for 
his  people,  but  a  denominational  table  for  those 
only  who  are  of  our  denomination.  If  the  system 
is  justifiable,  there  is  nothing  to  gain  by  urging 
false  pleas  in  its  behalf  and  cloaking  its  deformi- 
ties under  falsehoods,  nor  anything  to  be  feared  by 
placing  it  on  its  true  basis  and  attempting  to  de- 
fend it  as  it  is.  Should  it  fall  when  placed  there, 
and  left  to  stand  without  the  fictitious  props  which 
now  support  it,  let  it  fall.  It  is  unworthy  to 
stand ;  and  the  sooner  it  falls  the  better,  as  well  for 
those  who  practise  it  as  for  the  church  at  large, 
and  for  the  general  advancement,  among  men,  of 
the  pure  and  ennobling  principles  of  the  gospel  of 
the  Son  of  God. 

Yours,  as  ever,  in  all  sincerity,  &c. 


LETTER  VI. 

COMMUNION  NOT  A  SYMBOL  OF  INDIVIDUAL  CHURCH 
FELLOWSHIP. 

A  third  ground  of  defence — A  strange  position — A  false 
one — No  proof  to  sustain  it — Proof  against  it — An  ex- 
ample of  a  particular-church  ordinance — If  this  ground 
of  defence  is  good,  useless  to  talk  of  baptism  as  a  term 
of  communion,  or  of  other  Baptists  as  disorderly 
walkers — The  position  falsified  by  the  universal  prac- 
tice of  restricted  communionists — What  is  necessary  to 
a  right  reception  of  the  ordinance — The  presence  of  a 
minister  not  necessary — Andrew  Fuller's  opinion — Ex- 
amples of  apostolic  communion;  at  Tezpoor;  at  the 
sessions  of  the  Evangelical  Alliance,  London,  1851 — 
Conclusion. 

My  Dear  Friend  : — I  come  now  to  notice  your 
third  position.  First,  you  said  you  restricted  the 
Lord's  supper  from  others  on  the  score  of  their 
not  being  baptized ;  but  seeing  that  this  is  not  the 
true  ground  on  which  you  proceed,  you  endea- 
vored to  justify  yourself  by  saying  that  those  who 
are  not  members  of  close-communion  churches  are 
disorderly  walkers,  from  whom  we  are  commanded 
to  withdraw ;  but  finding  that  you  are  not  sus- 
tained in  this,  you  now  say  that  sacramental  com- 


COMMUNION  NOT  CIIURCH  FELLOWSHIP.      117 

mimion  is  a  token  of  individual-church  fellowship, 
to  which  members  of  other  churches  have  no 
right,  and  ought  not  to  feel  hurt  if  not  invited. 
This  is  the  ground  Prof.  Curtis  takes,  with  a  view, 
as  he  informs  us,  to  satisfy  those  individuals  of  the 
propriety  of  restriction,  who  can  neither  see  how 
the  want  of  baptism  in  itself  can  be  a  barrier  to 
communion,  nor  believe  that  the  supper  was  ever 
intended  to  be  a  denominational  ordinance.  This 
position  is  certainly  a  very  singular  one,  to  say 
nothing  else  of  it.  And  so  Mr.  Curtis  acknow- 
ledges ;  for  he  concedes  that  "  all  parties  in  this 
country  appear  satisfied  so  far  as  church  member- 
ship is  concerned,"*  whilst,  at  the  same  time,  he 
admits  the  existence  of  a  general  dissatisfaction 
among  Christians  respecting  the  mode  in  which 
Baptists  administer  the  supper,  which  could  not  be 
the  case  if  they  considered  the  breaking  of  bread 
"  a  token,  divinely  appointed  to  symbolize, 
among  other  things,  the  relation  which  each  mem- 
ber of  any  particular  church  bears  to  every  other 
member  ;"f  a  virtual  admission,  on  Mr.  C.'s  part, 
that  the  view  he  attempts  to  defend  is  a  novel 
and  repugnant  one.  The  younger  Fuller  goes 
even  farther  than  this,  and  denies  to  the  supper 
the  character  of    a   particular-church  ordinance. 

*  On  Com.,  p.  107.         \  Ibid.  pp.  116,  117. 


118  OPEN    COMMUNION. 

When  he  says,  "  We  admit  that  our  (Pedobaptist) 
brethren  are  entitled  to  the  Lord's  supper,  inas- 
much as  all  Christians  are  entitled  to  all  the  privi- 
leges of  the  Christian  church,"*  he  cannot  consi- 
der it  a  particular-church  privilege,  for  he  calls  it 
expressly  one  of  the  privileges  of  the  Christian 
church.  Nor  indeed  does  Mr.  Curtis  really  consi- 
der it  such,  as  I  have  already  shown.  The  truth 
is,  the  position  is  not  only  a  singular  one,  but  a 
false  one.  There  is  nothing  in  history,  revelation, 
reason,  or  facts  to  sustain  it.  That  the  Lord's  sup- 
per is  a  social  ordinance  is  plain  enough.  But 
that  it  belongs  to  individual  churches  and  is  to  be 
observed  by  them  as  churches  in  the  common 
acceptation  of  the  word,  instead  of  belonging  to 
the  disciples  of  Christ  to  be  observed  by  them  as 
disciples,  whether  they  are  members  of  our  private 
family  circle,  or  of  a  band  of  our  Christian  friends 
and  relatives  meeting  with  us,  or  of  our  particular 
church,  or  of  a  dozen  churches,  of  an  association, 
a  presbytery,  or  any  other  body  of  Christians, 
assembled  for  worship  or  where  worship  would  be 
appropriate,  whether  in  our  dwelling  houses  or  our 
Banctuaries,  whether  with  or  without  an  ordained 
minister,  is  a  proposition  yet  to  be  demonstrated. 
Mr.  Booth  lays  it  down,  that  "  the  Lord's  supper 

*  On  Com.  Conv.  3. 


COMMUNION  NOT  CHURCH  FELLOWSHIP.      119 

is  a  church  ordinance,  nor  ought  ever  to  be  ad- 
ministered but  to  a  particular  church  as  such;" 
but  does  not  prove  it.     Dr.  Fuller  does  the  same. 
He  affirms  that  "  the  Lord's  supper  belongs  to 
visible  churches,  and  is  to  be  observed  by  these 
churches  as  churches."     But  he  does  not  prove  it. 
The  most  he  does  do  is  to  show  that  it  is  a  social 
ordinance  for  Christians,  and  not  for  the  world  ;  a 
point  which  nobody  questions.     Even  Prof.  Curtis 
not  only  begs  the  question  altogether,  but  denies 
it  again  and  again,  and  proves  anything  but  the 
proposition  he  lays  down  to  be  established.     His 
book,  indeed,  as  a  specimen  of  logic,  is  a  perfect 
curiosity.     As  evidence  of  the  correctness  of  the 
view  he  advances,  he  points  to  1  Cor.  xi.  21,  33. 
" *  When  ye   come   together  therefore   into   one 
place,  this  is  not  to  eat  the  Lord's  supper.    For  in 
eating,    every    one    taketh     before    other,'    &c. 
4  Wherefore,  my  brethren,  when  ye  come  together 
to  eat,  tarry  one  for  another.'  "     From  the  coming 
together  of  the  Corinthians  to  eat  the  supper  and 
from  their  being  exhorted  to  tarry  one  for  another, 
he  concludes  not  that  we  are  thereby  taught  when 
we  do  come  together  for  the  purpose  of  breaking 
bread  that  we  should  do  it  decently  and  appropri- 
ately, but  "  that  the  Lord's  supper  is  committed  to 

*  P.  85. 


120  OPEN    COMMUNION. 

the  guardianship  of  visible  churches  !"     He  refers, 
too,  in  illustration  and  support  of  his  position,  to 
the  Jewish  passover ;  and  because  it  was  eaten  in 
families  and  by  families,  he  is  pleased  to  call  it  a 
family  ordinance ;  a  mode  of  reasoning  that  would 
prove  our  national  fasts  to  be  church  fasts,  and  our 
state  thanksgivings,  family  thanksgivings,    since 
they  are  observed  by  churches  and  by  families. 
Every  body  knows,  however,  that  the  passover  was 
not  to  commemorate  some  family  deliverance,  or 
mark  some  family  relations  less   comprehensive 
than  the  family  of  Israel — the  Hebrew  nation. 
It  was  not  expressive  of  relations  subsisting  between 
individuals  as  dwellers  together  under  the  same 
roof,  or  partakers  of  daily  food  at  the  same  table, 
as  you  and  he  argue  when  you  would  have  it 
thought  that  the  Lord's  supper  was  instituted  and 
enjoined  for  a  purpose  somewhat  similar.     Such 
an  idea  is  unworthy  of  any  reader  of  the  Scrip- 
tures, much  more  of  the  senior  Professor  of  a 
Theological  Seminary.     Mr.  C.  assumes,  too,  that 
the  twelve  disciples  were  a  church,  according  to  the 
common  idea  of  a  church  as  an  organization  ;  and 
in  addition  to  this,  that  because  the  Savior  insti- 
tuted the  supper  in  their  presence,  without  calling 
in  his   mother,  or  Martha,  or  her  sister,  or  the 
seventy,  or  any  others,  it  was  as  a  particular-church 
ordinance  that  he  instituted  it !    This  is  a  sample 


COMMUNION    NOT    CHURCH    FELLOWSHIP.      121 

of  "  the  able  argumentation "  that  runs  through 
his  whole  book.  With  equal  conclusiveness  might 
I  assume  that  the  twelve  were  an  association,  or  a 
presbytery,  and  infer  that  because  the  Savior  insti- 
tuted the  supper  in  their  presence  alone,  therefore 
it  must  be  an  associational  or  presbyterial  ordi- 
nance, to  be  celebrated  only  by  the  clergy  when 
convened  in  an  association  or  a  presbytery.  Or 
granting  that  the  eleven  were  "a  church,"  I 
might  with  equal  propriety  argue  that  Christian 
baptism  is  a  particular-church  ordinance  to  be 
administered  only  to  churches  as  churches,  because 
it  was  instituted  in  the  presence  of  these  disciples 
alone,  and  its  administration  given  in  charge  to 
them,  and  not  to  Mary,  or  Martha,  or  any  other  of 
the  disciples.* 

So  instinctively  unscriptural  is  this  position  of 
yours,  that  it  would  be  an  altogether  uncalled  for 
expenditure  of  words,  to  enter  into  any  argument 
to  show  its  falsity.  •  Suffice  it  simply  to  refer  to 
two  facts.  First,  as  there  were  in  the  apostles' 
days  no  such  bodies  as  those  now  called  churches, 
so  there  could  not  have  been  any  symbol  of 
fellowship  between  individuals  as  members  of 
such  churches — a  fellowship,  as  Mr.  Curtis  tells 
us,  over  and  above  that  fellowship  which  Christ- 

*  See  Matt,  xxviii.  16-19. 
11 


122  OPEN    COMMUNION. 

ians  have  with  Christians,  as  members  of  the 
body  of  Christ.  In  the  second  place,  we  read,  in 
Acts  ii.,  that  the  disciples,  after  the  day  of  Pente- 
cost, continued  with  one  accord  upon  the  apostles' 
instructions  in  the  temple,  but  that  they  broke 
bread  from  house  to  house,  or  at  home.  Instead 
of  considering  the  celebration  of  the  supper  an 
act  for  churches  as  churches,  they  observed  it  as 
an  institution  for  Christians  as  Christians,  com- 
memorating their  Lord's  death  in  the  way  and 
place  to  them  most  natural,  meet,  and  convenient, 
while,  at  the  same  time,  agreeable  to  the  object  of 
the  ordinance.  And  thus  it  was  regarded  and 
observed  not  only  in  the  apostolic  age,  but  for 
ages  after.  As  Neander  remarks :  "  As  to  the 
celebration  of  the  holy  supper,  it  continued  to  be 
connected  with  the  common  meal,  in  which  all,  as 
members  of  one  family,  joined,  agreeably  to  its 
first  institution."  * 

If  you  ask  for  an  example  of  a  particular-church 
ordinance,  I  would  instance  a  church  meeting, 
where  one  is  entitled  to  act  on  ordinary  matters 
relating  to  the  church  of  which  he  is  a  member, 
cast  his  vote,  &c. ;  a  right  to  which  no  one  who 
is  not  a  member  of  that  church,  is  entitled  or  feels 
entitled  in  consequence   of  his   being  a  church 

*  Planting  and  Training,  &c,  p.  103. 


COMMUNION    NOT    CHURCH    FELLOWSHIP.     123 

member  elsewhere.  It  is  riot  an  institution  of 
Christ's,  like  baptism  or  the  Lord's  supper.  Mem- 
ber* of  other  churches  can  lay  no  claim  to  it,  for 
the  simple  reason  that  they  are  not  members  'of 
the  body  for  whom  it  was  instituted  and  designed. 
Not  so  the  Lord's  supper.  This  is  an  ordinance 
common  to  the  professed  members  of  his  body. 
It  is  non-professors  and  professors  that  are  walking 
disorderly  in  the  scriptural  sense  of  the  phrase, 
who  alone  can  be  debarred  from  it  on  the  ground 
that  they  are  not  members  of  the  body  for  whom 
it  was  instituted :  a  remark  which  cannot  be  made 
respecting  the  business  meetings  of  individual 
churches. 

But  if  this  position  of  yours  be  correct,  it  is  all 
folly  to  talk  about  baptism  as  a  term  of  com- 
munion, or  of  members  of  other  churches  as 
disorderly  walkers.  Restricted  communion,  on 
this  ground,  is  not  only  an  abandonment  of  the 
position  taken  by  Dr.  Howell,  that  repentance, 
faith,  and  baptism  are  the  terms  of  approach  to 
the  Lord's  table,  "to  which  those  who  have 
observed  these  preliminaries  cannot  afterwards  be 
debarred  of  access,  but  in  consequence  of  a  for- 
feiture of  Christian  character  by  immorality  or 
heresy  ;"  but  it  is  also  a  professed  abandonment 
of  the  position  exposed  in  my  last  letter,  that  the 
supper  is  a  denominational   ordinance,  and,   a* 


124  OPEN    COMMUNION. 

such,  cannot  be  celebrated  with  any  out  of  the 
denomination.  It  first  makes  every  celebration 
of  the  Lord's  supper,  not  observed  by  a  chwch 
as  a  church,  an  illegal  act ;  then  makes  member- 
ship in  the  particular  church  in  which  it  is 
observed,  the  only  and  the  necessary  qualification 
for  communion.  So  that  if  this  is  the  rule  that  is 
to  direct  us  in  our  administrations  of  the  supper, 
the  less  that  is  said  about  anything  else  as  a 
reason  for  practising  restricted  communion  the 
better.  I  sometimes  wonder  how  many  more 
turns  you  will  take  in  defence  of  your  practice, 
before  you  will  allow  that  it  is  a  thing  you 
adopted  before  you  were  aware  of  its  true  charac- 
ter, and  in  the  magnanimity  of  Christian  con- 
sistency abandon  it,  instead  of  trying  to  defend  it 
with  arguments  so  perfectly  puerile  and  unworthy 
of  yourself. 

I  have  all  along  been  supposing  that  you,  and 
Mr.  Curtis,  and  others,  who  contend  that  the 
supper  is  divinely  appointed  as  a  symbol  of 
individual-church  fellowship,  do  really  regard  and 
administer  it  thus.  But  the  truth  is,  you  do  not. 
Your  constant  practice  speaks  another  language. 
It  says  that  you  would  have  the  communion  to 
indicate  that  those  who  break  bread  together,  are 
not  necessarily  members  of  the  same  church,  but 
of  the  same  denomination.     If  the  Lord's  suppe: 


COMMUNION    NOT    CHURCH    FELLOWSHIP.     125 

be  indeed  divinely  instituted  as  a  token  that  all 
who  commune  together  upon  any  given  occasion 
are  members  of  the  same  visible  church,  it  cannot, 
either  truthfully  or  lawfully,  be  celebrated  together 
by  any  who  are  not  members  of  the  same  church. 
A  minister  cannot  even  break  bread  with  a  church 
over  which  he  is  not  pastor  and  to  which  he  does 
not  belong.  The  members  of  an  association 
cannot  commune  with  the  church  with  whom 
they  meet  to  transact  their  business.  In  short,  all 
communion  must  be  done  away  except  between 
members  of  the  same  visible  church.  This,  how- 
ever, is  drawing  the  cords  of  restriction  much 
tighter  than  you  or  others  have  ever  done  it,  or,  I 
trust,  will  ever  be  willing  to  do  it.  I  rejoice  that 
your  practice  does  not  exhibit  quite  so  gross  an 
abuse  of  this  sacred  ordinance.  You  hold  that 
we  have  a  right  to  invite  members  of  other 
churches  to  commune  with  us,  provided  they  be 
of  the  same  faith  and  order.  But  in  so  doing, 
you  practically  deny  the  Lord's  supper  to  be  a 
token  of  individual-church  fellowship. 

Why,  then,  all  this  meaningless  talk  about  the 
Lord's  supper's  being  a  divinely  appointed  symbol 
of  such  fellowship  ?  It  is  but  another  cloak  only 
half  thrown  over  a  deformed  figure  to  screen  from 
observation  deformities  which  will  not  suffer  them- 
selves to  be  screened,  and  which  are  too  prominent 
11* 


126  OPEN    COMMUNION. 

to  be  hidden.  It  is  a  position  opposed  not  only 
to  your  own  sentiments  and  practice,  but  to  truth 
and  Scripture. 

All  that  is  necessary  to  a  scriptural  and  proper 
reception  of  the  memorials  of  the  love  and  death 
of  our  Lord,  is  that  we  receive  them  from  time  to 
time,  as  his  professed  disciples,  in  faith,  in  remem- 
brance of  him,  and  in  a  manner  becoming  an  act 
so  sacred.  As  to  the  time,  it  may  be  the  Sabbath 
or  a  week  day ;  and  as  to  the  occasion,  it  may  be 
the  assembling  together  of  a  church,  or  the  meet- 
ing of  an  association,  or  of  a  few  Christian  friends 
at  a  private  house,  or  of  any  Christians  worshipping 
together  in  any  place,  either  with  or  without  an 
ordained  minister. 

It  would  be  well  if  Christians  acted  more  on 
this  apostolic  plan,  especially  if  churches,  when 
without  pastors,  would  continue  steadfast  in  their 
observance  of  the  Lord's  supper.  Not  merely  is 
there  nothing  in  the  injunction,  "  This  do  in  re- 
membrance of  me,"  or  in  the  Scriptures,  or  early 
history  of  the  church,  that  tends  in  the  least  to 
favor  the  idea  that  the  supper  is  for  churches  as 
churches ;  but  there  is  nothing  in  them  tending 
even  to  show  the  necessity  of  the  presence  of  an 
ordained  minister  to  preside  and  administer  the 
emblems.  In  this  I  am  happy  to  have  the  con- 
currence of  so  distinguished  a  restricted  commu- 


COMMUNION    NOT    CHURCH    FELLOWSHIP.     127 

nionist  as  Andrew  Fuller.  "  I  see  nothing  objec- 
tionable," he  says,  "if,  when  a  church  is  destitute 
of  a  pastor,  the  Lord's  supper  were  administered 
by  a  deacon  or  aged  brother.  I  know  of  no  scrip- 
tural authority  for  confining  it  to  ministers.  Nay, 
I  do  not  recollect  any  mention  in  the  Scriptures 
of  a  minister  being  employed  in  it,  unless  we 
reckon  our  Lord  one."  Again,  in  giving  the  sub- 
stance of  a  reply  he  made  to  a  Baptist  church  in 
Edinburgh  in  1805,  respecting  administering  the 
Lord's  supper  without  an  ordained  elder,  he  says, 
"  I  told  them  that  I  had  long  been  of  opinion  that 
there  was  no  scriptural  authority  for  confining  the 
administration  of  the  Lord's  supper  to  a  minister. 
I  had  no  doubt  but  that  the  primitive  pastors  did 
preside  at  the  Lord's  table,  as  well  as  in  the  recep- 
tion and  exclusion  of  members,  and  in  short  in  all 
the  proceedings  of  the  church ;  and  that  where 
there  was  a  pastor,'  it  was  proper  that  he  should 
continue  to  do  so.  But  that,  when  a  pastor  died  or 
was  removed,  the  church  was  not  obliged  to  desist 
from  commemorating  the  Lord's  death,  any  more 
than  from  receiving  or  excluding  members  ;  and 
that  it  was  as  lawful  for  them  to  appoint  a  deacon 
or  any  senior  member  to  preside  in  the  one  case  as 
in  the  other.  Finally,  I  told  them  that  it  was  not 
the  practice  of  our  English  churches  ;  that  they, 
many  of  them,  would  send  for  the  pastors  of  other 


128  OPEN    COMMUNION. 

churches  to  perform  this  office;  and  that  I,  for 
one,  had  often  complied  with  such  requests.  / 
could  wish,  however,,  that  it  were  otherwise,  and 
that  every  church,  when  destitute  of  a  pastor,  would 
attend  to  the  Lord's  supper  among  themselves."* 

Before  closing  this  letter,  let  me  adduce,  in 
illustration  of  my  views,  a  couple  of  examples, 
from  modern  times,  of  what  I  consider  apostolic 
communion;  the  one  affording  an  instance  of 
communing  at  home;  the  other,  of  communing 
after  the  Pauline  manner  when  the  disciples  as- 
sembled together  for  the  purpose. 

The  first  you  will  find  in  the  Missionary  Maga- 
zine for  February,  1852,  page  114.  Mr.  Danforth 
of  our  Mission  in  Assam,  writing  from  his  station, 
Gowahatti,  under  date  of  November  26,  1851, 
after  speaking  of  his  attending  the  general  meeting 
of  the  Mission  at  Sibsagor,  says,  "  On  our  return 
we  called  on  Mr.  Bruce  of  Tezpoor,  where  we 
spent  one  day.  In  the  evening  some  of  the  friends 
of  the  station  called  upon  us,  after  which  we  had 
a  short  religious  service  and  administered  the 
Lord's  supper.  The  communion  was  a  refreshing 
season,  and  reminded  us  of  the  primitive  Christians 
who  frequently  broke  bread  in  the  middle  of  the 
night ;"  and,  he  might  have  added,  at  their  homes 
and  among  their  Christian  friends. 

*  Works,  vol.  iii.  pp.  494,  496. 


COMMUNION    NOT    CHURCH    FELLOWSHIP.     129 

The  other  example  occurred  a  short  time  before, 
at  the  close  of  the  sessions  of  the  Evangelical  Alli- 
ance in  London,  August,  1851.  "It  had  been 
proposed  that  the  foreign  brethren  should  invite 
the  members  of  the  Conference,  as  well  as  those 
who  had  been  present  at  its  sessions,  to  join  them 
in  partaking  of  the  sacred  elements,  the  pledges 
of  the  union  of  all  true  Christians  in  their  divine 
Head.  Accordingly  they  assembled,  more  than 
four  hundred  persons,  of  all  nations,  speaking  dif- 
ferent languages,  and  attached  to  distinct  deno- 
minational connexions;  but  all  united  in  their 
profession  of  a  common  Christianity,  all  engaged 
in  the  same  labors  for  disseminating  it,  all  serving 
under  one  celestial  King,  and  all  hoping  for  an 

admission  into  one  heavenly  world The 

scene  reminded  one  strongly  of  the  time  when  all 
kindreds  shall  unite  with  one  voice  in  a  common 
hymn  of  praise  to  their  Savior,  and  when,  instead 
of  many  tongues,  there  shall  be  one  immortal  lan- 
guage. After  the  conclusion  of  the  ceremony 
addresses  were  made  in  their  native  languages  by 
Mr.  Fisch  of  Lyons,  Dr.  Kuntze  of  Berlin,  and  Bap- 
tist W.  Noel  of  London  ;  and  when  hymns  had 
been  again  sung,  the  exercises  were  concluded  by 
Dr.  Baird.  I  have  never  witnessed  a  scene,"  says 
the  writer  of  this  account,  "  which  showed  more 
evidently  the  union  of  Christians,  notwithstanding 


130  OPEN    COMMUNION. 

their  own  peculiar  tenets,  and  a  more  convincing 
answer  to  the  calumnious  accusations  of  adversa- 
ries who  seek  to  find  in  these  peculiarities  eviden- 
ces of  dissension."* 

Whenever  Christians  are  assembled  together 
thus,  and  can  unite,  as  was  done  on  either  of 
these  occasions,  in  commemorating  their  Lord's 
death,  nothing  can  be  plainer,  it  would  seem,  than 
that  it  is  both  lawful  and  meet  for  them  to  do  so, 
whatever  their  particular-church  connexions  may 
be.  To  me  there  is  something  exceedingly  Ro- 
mish in  the  idea  that  the  supper  should  be 
received  at  the  hands  of  a  church  as  a  particular- 
church  act.  It  bespeaks  subjection  to  an  enact- 
ment that  is  perishable  after  the  manner  of  all 
human  impositions.  It  robs  the  emblematic  sup- 
per of  that  gospel  simplicity  and  freedom  from 
yokes  peculiar  to  the  New  Testament  dispensation, 
with  which  it  was  invested  by  the  Savior  at  its  i 
institution. 

But  I  have  already  dwelt  too  long  on  this  point. 
Restricted  communion,  even  if  it  were  practised 
on  this  ground,  could  not  be  defended  on  it  for  a 
moment.  As  an  ordinance  for  the  household  of 
faith,  its  participation  can  be  a  symbol  of  no  fel- 
lowship less  embracing  than   fellowship    among 

*  N.  Y.  Journal  of  Commerce,  Sept.  24,  1851. 


COMMUNION    NOT    CHURCH    FELLOWSHIP.     131 

individuals  as  members  of  that  household ;  and  so 
long  as  this  consists  of  more  than  one  congrega- 
tion of  Christians,  or  includes  more  than  one  de- 
nomination, it  cannot  be  a  symbol  of  either  deno- 
minational or  particular-church  fellowship.  Your 
plea  for  restriction,  therefore,  on  the  ground  that 
communion  is  a  symbol  of  individual-church  fel- 
lowship, is  as  unfounded  as  that  which  proceeds 
upon  the  assumption  that  it  is  only  "  for  the  church 
in  gospel  order ;"  and  both  are  equally  contrary 
to  truth  and  apostolic  precedent. 

In  all  sincerity,  I  am,  as  ever, 

Yours,  &c. 


LETTER  VII. 

CONCLUDING    CONSIDERATIONS. 

Restricted  communion  an  uncandid  system — Places 
others  in  a  false  lights  unchurching  them  and  placing 
them  on  a  level  with  unbelieving  Jews,  &c. — The  true 
position  of  Pedobaptists  illustrated — The  fact  not  to 
be  overlooked  that  all  were  agreed  in  the  apostles' 
days  as  to  what  baptism  was,  not  so  now — Close 
communion  clashes  with  the  spirit  of  Christ — The  sad 
shifts  often  made  in  consequence. — The  practice  schis- 
matic— As  a  policy,  false — Dr.  Carson's  testimony — 
A  desecration  of  the  Lord's  supper — A  modern  inno- 
vation— Conclusion. 

My  Dear  Friend  : — I  have  now  finished  my 
examination  of  the  several  reasons  you  urge  in 
defence  of  restricted  communion.  But,  in  addi- 
tion to  what  I  have  already  advanced,  there  are 
several  facts  which,  in  deciding  upon  the  merits 
of  this  question,  I  deem  worthy  of  no  little  consi- 
deration. These  I  will  now  lay  before  you,  then 
conclude  all  I  have  to  say  for  the  present  respect- 
ing your  practice. 

1.  One  of  the  first  things  that  strikes  an  indi- 
vidual in  looking  at  the  system  of  restricted  com- 


CONCLUDING    CONSIDERATIONS.  133 

mimion,  is  its  glaring  want  of  candor  and  consis- 
tency. It  is  not  what  it  professes  if)  be.  It 
restricts  the  supper  from  others  professedly  on  the 
ground  of  their  not  being  baptized.  It  asserts  its 
readiness  to  admit  to  the  Lord's  table  any  who 
have  been  baptized  and  are  leading  irreproachable 
Christian  lives.  Yet  it  excludes  many  such,  and 
betrays  an  utter  insincerity  of  profession.  When 
met  with  this  fact,  it  changes  its  ground,  takes 
another  stand,  and  yet  another,  and  says,  com- 
munion is  a  symbol  of  particular-church  fellow- 
ship, and  therefore  it  is  that  others  are  excluded. 
But  in  so  doing,  it  takes  a  stand  equally  false,  the 
supper  being  never  administered  as  a  particular- 
church  ordinance,  but  as  a  denominational  obser- 
vance. There  is  a  want  of  candor  on  the  part  of 
its  advocates,  in  not  presenting  their  reasons  for  it 
in  their  true  light  and  on  their  true  bases,  while 
they  endeavor  to  shield  themselves  under  subter- 
fuges which  have  only  the  appearance  of  truth. 
A  system  that  needs  such  a  mode  of  defence  is  not 
of  God.  He  is  light,  and  in  him  is  no  darkness 
at  all.  And  if  we  would  walk  in  the  light  as  he 
is  in  the  light,  we  should  not  be  close  commu- 
nionists. 

2.  It  places  others  in  a  false  position.     There  is 
no  system  of  restricted  communion  that  can  be 
adopted  without  doing  this.    But  it  is  emphati- 
12 


134  OPEN    COMMUNION. 

cally  true  of  the  system  you  pursue.  It  practi- 
cally unchurches  other  denominations,  and  throws 
them  among  the  unbelieving,  non-professing  world. 
You  withhold  the  supper,  then  say,  "  Were  un- 
baptized  persons  admitted  in  the  apostles'  days  ?" 
Supposing,  for  argument's  sake,  that  they  were 
not ;  what  then  I  "  Why,"  you  say,  "  Pedobap- 
tists  ought  not  therefore  to  be  admitted  now."  Is 
not  this  placing  them  on  the  same  footing  with  the 
infidel  Jews  and  idolatrous  heathen  of  old  ?  Un- 
baptized  persons,  if  not  allowed  to  come  to  the 
Lord's  table  then,  were  excluded  not  because  they 
had  not  received  the  ordinance  of  baptism,  but 
because  they  could  not  be  regarded  as  fellow- 
disciples.  If  we  proceed  on  apostolic  principles, 
we  must  make  use  of  apostolic  reasons  for  the 
course  we  pursue.  You  profess  to  proceed  on  such 
principles ;  you  profess,  therefore,  virtually  to  de- 
cline communion  with  others  because  you  cannot 
regard  them  in  any  other  light  than  as  non-pro- 
fessors, or  at  least  as  faithless  and  disobedient 
professors. 

And  this  you  do,  not  by  implication  merely,  but 
in  the  most  unequivocal  terms  possible,  calling  them 
disobedient,  disorderly,  rebellious,  disregarded  of 
the  divine  will,  &c. ;  language  appropriate  only  to 
such  as  are  of  the  synagogue  of  Satan.  Just  look, 
for  a  moment,  at  the  language  of  those  whom  you 


CONCLUDING    CONSIDERATIONS.  135 

point  to  as  the  defenders  of  your  practice,  with 
whom,  you  hesitate  not  to  say,  you  agree  perfectly 
in  these  assertions.  "  All  Pedobaptists,"  says  one, 
"  are,  however  ignorantly,  openly  disobedient  to  a 
command  of  Christ."*  Says  another,  "They 
refuse  subjection  to  Christ  and  violate  the  laws  of 
his  house."f  And  another,  "  The  essential  pre- 
liminaries  being  disregarded,  they  cannot  approach 
the  table  of  the  Lord."J  "  Their  reception  by  us 
would,  on  our  part,  amount  to  a  conspiracy  with 
them  in  their  design  to  overthrow  the  law  of  God, 
and  render  us,  not  Christian  communicants,  but 
partners  in  their  rebellion  against  the  authority  of 
the  supreme  Legislator  /"§  Evangelical  and  pious 
Pedobaptists  disobedient  and  rebellious !  Holy 
men  like  Owen  and  Baxter,  Doddridge  and  Scott, 
Chalmers  and  McCheyne,  Edwards  and  Davies, 
Whitefield  and  Tennent,  Brainerd  and  Payson 
openly  disobedient!  rebels  against  the  authority 
of  God  !  refusing  subjection  to  Christ,  and  design- 
ing to  overthrow  his  laws !  "Would  to  God  we 
had  more  such  !  or  that  all  who  mate  these  mo- 
dest charges,  and  consider  themselves  obedient 
above  others,  would  only  supply  their  place !  But 
where  does  such  language  place  "all  Pedobap- 

*  Curtis  on  Com.,  p.  248.     \  Kinghorn,  Terms  of  Com. 
%  Howell  on  Com.,  p.  178.  §  Ibid.,  p.  87. 


136  OPEN    COMMUNION. 

tists  ?"  Out  of  "  the  church  which  is  subject  unto 
Christ"  among  the  godless  whose  sentence,  as 
written  out  by  the  pen  of  inspiration,  is,  "  Unto 
them  that  are  contentious  and  obey  not  the  truth 
but  obey  unrighteousness,  indignation  and  wrath, 
tribulation  and  anguish."  It  not  only  throws 
them  out  of  the  visible  church,  but  out  of  the  in- 
visible. Can  you  be  surprised  to  hear  close  com- 
munionists  denounced  as  illiberal  and  bigoted 
when  they  make  use  of  such  language,  and  prac- 
tise a  course  which,  if  consistently  interpreted, 
necessarily  leads  to  the  unchurching  and  condem- 
nation of  every  body  but  themselves  ? 

I  would  ask,  in  all  kindness  and  for  truth's  sake, 
if  it  would  not  be  more  just  and  in  accordance 
with  facts  if,  instead  of  calling  our  brethren  rebels, 
and  disregarded  of  the  divine  will,  you  would  be 
content  with  pronouncing  them  either  mistaken  or 
ignorant  of  that  will,  as  they  themselves  regard  us 
on  account  of  our  views  of  baptism.  We  would 
do  well  to  have,  at  least,  charity  enough  to  suppose 
that  they  are  Pedobaptists,  not  through  disobedi- 
ence and  rebelliousness,  but  through  the  influence 
of  education,  and  early  formed  impressions,  and,  it 
may  be,  other  circumstances  perfectly  compatible 
with  "  the  answer  of  a  good  conscience,"  a  con- 
science quite  as  sensitive  to  the  claims  of  truth  and 
duty  generally  as  ours.     Pedobaptists"  are  such, 


CONCLUDING    CONSIDERATIONS.  137 

just  as  we  are  Baptists — from  education  and  prin- 
ciple. As  such,  they  only  do  what  in  their  love 
for  their  Master  they  honestly  and  sacredly  believe 
to  be  in  accordance  with  his  will.  There  is  no 
forcing  their  consciences  any  more  than  the  con- 
sciences of  Baptists.  And  to  charge  men  that 
walk  with  God  with  open  disobedience  and  a  de- 
sign to  overthrow  the  law  of  God,  instead  of  allow- 
ing, as  truth  and  candor  require,  that  they  walk 
according  to  the  light  that  is  in  them,  is  to  place 
them  in  a  grossly  false  position  ;  and  to  refuse  to 
commune  with  them  because  they  will  not  sin 
against  their  souls,  is  to  act  more  in  accordance 
with  the  genius  of  Hildebrand  than  the  spirit  of 
Christ. 

To  set  the  matter  in  its  true  light,  take  an  illus- 
tration. A  father,  residing  in  a  distant  country, 
sends  home  to  his  son  a  communication  containing 
certain  directions  which  he  desires  that  son  to 
comply  with.  The  son  loves  his  father  and  desires 
to  carry  out  his  will.  But  for  some  reason  or 
other,  not  arguing  a  rebellious  spirit  at  all,  nor  a 
design  to  overthrow  his  father's  injunctions,  nor 
even  a  want  of  love,  he  mistakes  his  father's  mind, 
and  fails  of  complying  with  the  exact  letter  of  his 
communication.  The  spirit  of  the  requirement, 
however,  is  carried  out.  Can  any  one  say,  that 
son  is  disobedient  ?  Has  he  not  rendered  obedi- 
12* 


138  OPEN    COMMUNION. 

ence  to  the  best  of  his  knowledge  ?  Or,  is  it  true, 
that  however  much  he  may  have  been  desirous  of 
carrying  out  his  father's  will,  he  was  still  disobe- 
dient ?  Does  obedience  lie  in  the  letter  and  not 
in  the  spirit  3  Every  one  sees  that  a  charge  of 
disobedience  against  such  a  son  would  be  a  most 
foul  calumny.  But  his  case  is  precisely  similar  to 
that  of  our  brethren  against  whom  these  charges 
of  disobedience,  rebellion,  and  insubordination  are 
preferred. 

Overlooking  entirely  the  influence  of  education 
and  of  contact  with  men  and  things  around  us  in 
shaping  our  views,  you  argue  as  though  you  felt 
that  before  persons  enter  the  church  they  must  be 
perfect  apostles,  having  sifted  from  error  all  the 
creeds  of  those  with  whom  they  have  been  brought 
up,  so  as  to  be,  in  every  particular,  upon  scriptural 
ground.  Else  if  they  chance  to  enter  the  church 
as  Pedobaptists,  or  indeed  with  any  erroneous 
views,  they  are  disobedient  and  rebellious.  At 
this  rate,  the  entire  church  would  be  a  company 
of  rebels  and  contemners  of  the  divine  will.  But 
the  great  mass  of  Pedobaptists  are  such  from  edu- 
cation and  contact  with  Pedobaptist  principles; 
just  as  the  great  mass  of  Baptists  are  such  from  a 
corresponding  cause.  The  latter  are  no  more  obe- 
dient than  the  former;  nor  are  the  former  any 
more  entitled  to  the  name  of  rebels  than  the  latter. 


CONCLUDING    CONSIDERATIONS.  139 

Had  the  former  been  educated  as  Baptists,  the 
probability  is,  they  would  have  been  Baptists. 
Had  the  latter  been  educated  as  Pedobaptists,  the 
probability  is,  they  would  have  been  Pedobaptists. 
If  immersion  upon  a  profession  of  faith  were  the 
only  thing  now  known  as  baptism,  we  should  all 
be  Baptists ;  there  is  no  question  of  it.  But  if,  on 
the  other  hand,  the  only  baptism  known  consisted 
in  an  aspersion,  we  should  none  of  us  be  Baptists ; 
but,  alas !  we  should  all  be  "  disobedient,"  "  refus- 
ing subjection  to  Christ,"  and  consequently  with- 
out a  place  in  his  kingdom  !  The  fact  is  not  to 
be  overlooked,  as  you  yourself  admit,  that  in  the 
apostles'  days  all  were  agreed  as  to  what  baptism 
was.  The  whole  church  knew  of  but  one  form 
and  recognised  but  one.  A  refusal,  therefore,  to 
be  immersed  then  would  have  been  a  plain  case 
of  disobedience.  But  now  Christians  are  not 
agreed  upon  this  point;  and  equally  pious  men 
may  be  found  on  both  sides.  Under  existing  cir- 
cumstances what  propriety,  then,  or  truth  of  illus- 
tration is  there  in  saying,  "  Suppose  that  in  the 
days  of  the  apostles  any  one  had  refused  to  be 
immersed,  can  we  doubt  what  would  have  been 
his  treatment  ?  Who  believes  that  such  a  candi- 
date would  have  been  admitted  to  the  Lord's 
table  ?"*     I  ask  you  to  say  candidly  whether  pious 

*  See  R.  Fuller  on  Bapt.  and  Com,  p.  196. 


140  OPEN    COMMUNION. 

Pedobaptists  are  not,  by  such  reasoning,  placed 
upon  the  same  footing  with  contumacious  unbe- 
lievers? You  see  they  are.  Away,  then,  with 
these  false  charges  of  disobedience,  rebellion,  and 
disregard  of  the  divine  law !  Away  with  them 
for  ever !  It  makes  me  blush  for  Christianity  to 
hear  such  charges  uttered  by  Christians  against 
their  brethren  in  the  Lord. 

3.  It  is  mortifying  to  Christian  feelings.  It  is 
true,  as  you  say,  that  a  refusal  to  unite,  even  with 
those  we  most  love,  in  an  infraction  of  the  law 
of  God,  is  a  most  appropriate  exercise  of  our  best 
propensities.  But  no  law  of  God  is  broken  by 
communing  with  any  consistent  professing  Chris- 
tian. We  have  none  of  these  feelings  of  mortifi- 
cation in  declining  to  commune  with  non-pro- 
fessors, however  much  we  may  love  them,  or 
however  earnestly  we  may  desire  to  see  them 
warrantably  communing  with  us  ;  because  we  are 
satisfied  the  Lord's  supper  is  not  for  them.  Nor 
is  there  anything  repulsive  or  apparently  un- 
charitable in  declining  to  invite  members  of  other 
churches  and  denominations  to  a  place  in  our 
church  meetings,  and  giving  them  the  right  of 
suffrage  there.  But  why  is  this  ?  Plainly  be- 
cause the  one  is  an  institution  of  the  Lord's,  for 
the  Lord's  church  ;  while  the  other  is  ours,  for 
our  church.     Feeling  that  "  all  the  Lord's  children 


CONCLUDING    CONSIDERATIONS.  141 

have  an  undoubted  right  to  his  table,"  as  Dr. 
Howell  expresses  it,  and  that  those  whom  w7e 
decline  communing  with  as  members  of  other 
denominations,  are  his  children  following,  in  their 
love  for  Christ,  their  honest  convictions  of  duty 
as  we  do  ours,  is  it  strange  that  it  is  a  mortifica- 
tion to  us  to  decline  communion  with  them  ?  And 
does  not  this  mortification  of  feeling  evidently  arise 
from  a  consciousness  of  the  questionable  and  un- 
christlike  course  we  are  pursuing  ? 

I  might  give  a  number  of  instances  of  the 
awkward  situation  in  which  restricted  com- 
munionists  sometimes  feel  themselves  to  be  placed 
by  this  system,  and  of  the  puerile,  wretched,  and  un- 
becoming shifts  made  in  order  to  avoid  the  pain  of 
declining  to  commune  with  Pedobaptists.  But  a 
single  case  must  suffice.  The  Baptist  church  in  a 
beautiful  village  in  Northern  New  York  a  few 
summers  since,  was  without  a  pastor.  During 
that  time  a  ministering  Baptist  brother  came  to 
the  place  and  spent  a  few  weeks  on  a  visit.  On 
the  first  Sabbath  of  one  of  those  summer  months, 
the  Lord's  supper  was  to  be  administered  according 
to  the  usual  practice  of  the  church  when  not 
without  a  pastor.  Arrangements  were  made 
accordingly,  and  the  visiting  brother  who,  by  the 
way,  at  this  very  moment  holds  one  of  the  most 
influential  positions  in  the  denomination,  was  to 


142  OPEN    COMMUNION. 

officiate.  In  the  mean  time,  however,  a  distin- 
guished Congregational  minister  arrived  with  the 
view  of  spending  a  few  days  in  the  place  with 
some  of  his  friends  who  were  members  of  the 
Baptist  church.  Courtesy  in  part,  and  in  part  a  de- 
sire to  hear  the  truth  from  his  lips,  induced  our 
Bapdist  brother  to  request  him  to  preach  the 
Lord's  day  he  was  there.  This  happened  to  be 
the  first  Sabbath  in  the  month.  But  what  was  to  be 
done?  Could  they  invite  him  to  preach  for  them, 
and  then  attend  to  the  administration  of  the  sup- 
per after  giving  him  time  to  leave  the  house  ?  O 
no!  this  would  be  too  mortifying!  Besides, 
what  necessity  for  it  ?  He  was  to  be  there  but 
this  one  Sabbath,  and  as  it  was  an  extraordinary 
case,  the  church  being  without  a  pastor,  and  it 
mattering  very  little  whether  or  not  the  supper 
was  celebrated  at  its  regular  time,  to  avoid  all 
unpleasantness  the  communion,  it  was  said,  might 
as  well  as  not  be  deferred  till  the  next  Lord's  day. 
Accordingly  the  Lord's  supper  was,  on  this  account, 
deferred  till  the  ensuing  Sabbath,  when  our  Con- 
gregational brother  would  not  be  present  either 
to  break  to  them  the  bread  of  life,  or,  in  return, 
be  prevented  by  them  from  eating  so  much  as  a 
crumb  from  his  Master's  table.  Instances  like  this, 
you  know,  are  continually  occurring  among  our 
churches  in  one  form  or  another. 


CONCLUDING    CONSIDERATIONS.  143 

Now  the  question  arises,  If  it  is  right,  if  it  is  in 
accordance  with  the  spirit  of  Christ  to  refuse  a 
Pedobaptist  brother  a  place  at  the  Lord's  table, 
why  such  shifts  as  this  to  avoid  the  appearance 
of  unwillingness  to  commune  with  one  from 
whose  lips  the  truth  can  be  received  with  delight ; 
a  kind  of  shift  at  once  degrading  to  the  church 
that  makes  it  and  condemnatory  of  tile  system 
under  which  any  one  feels  necessitated  to  do  it? 
If  the  practice  is  right,  there  certainly  is  nothing 
to  be  ashamed  of  in  an  honest,  straightforward, 
fearless,  and  consistent  carrying  of  it  out.  But 
does  not  this  feeling  of  mortification  in  being 
compelled  to  decline  to  commune  with  men 
eminent  in  the  church,  and  distinguished  for  their 
piety  and  usefulness,  instinctively  tell  us  there  is 
something  wrong  somewhere  ?  The  very  fact 
that  close  communion  is  antagonistic  to  the  spirit 
of  Christ  and  the  promptings  of  brotherly  love, 
and  shrinks  from  being  brought  into  contact  with 
them,  is,  in  itself,  an  incontrovertible  proof  of  its 
unhallowed  nature ;  for  the  requirements  of  Christ 
are  only  an  embodiment  of  his  spirit,  and  a  pro- 
per carrying  out  of  those  can  never  conflict  with  this. 

4.  The  practice  is  also  schismatic  in  its  influence. 
It  recognises  a  wall  of  separation  between  the 
members  of  the  family  of  God  where,  of  all  places, 
such  a  separation  is  most  inconsistent  with  the  one- 


144  OPEN    COMMUNION. 

ness  of  the  Christian  brotherhood.     As  the  supper 
is  designed  for  all  acknowledged  fellow-disciples, 
the  non-communing  with   any  such  indicates,  if 
there  is  anything  in  the  symbolic  import  of  the 
ordinance,   that  between  the  communicants   and 
those  from  whom  the  supper  is  restricted,  there  is 
a  want  of  fellowship  as  members  of  the  body  of 
Christ.    It  is  true,  this  may  not  be  the  intention 
of  any  who  practise  restricted  communion  ;  '  but 
so  long  as  the  supper  is  considered,  as  it  was  in- 
tended to  be,  an  ordinance  for  Christ's  disciples 
irrespective  of  their  denominational  or  particular- 
church  connexions,  it  is   impossible  for  such  an 
impression  not  to  be  made  upon  those  who  know 
nothing  of  the  false  views  which  may  be  taken  of 
the   ordinance   by    such   as   administer   it   as   a 
denominational  institution.     The  consequence  is, 
this   apparent   non-fellowship   and    exclusiveness 
creates  distance  of  feeling,  repugnance,  and  dis- 
gust.    Nor   ought  any  one   to   expect   it  to   be 
otherwise ;  for  no  one  has  a  right  to  expect  the 
correct  views  of  others  to  be  accommodated  to  his 
own  unscriptural  and  false  ideas  of  things.     In  its 
practical  tendency,  therefore,  restricted  communion 
is  obviously  schismatic,  which  is  one  of  the  surest 
evidences  of  its  not   being   in    accordance  with 
the  mind  of  Christ.     Free  communion,   on  the 
contrary,  leads  Christians  to  a  deeper  conscious- 


CONCLUDING    CONSIDERATIONS.  145 

ness  of  the  fact  that,  however  much  they  may  differ 
in  name,  they  are  still  members  of  one  common 
family.  While  the  one  system  repels,  the  other 
tends  to  soften  down  denominational  prejudices, 
to  unite  Christians  in  closer  bonds,  and  to  prepare 
them  for  seeing  each  other  and  the  truth  through 
a  medium,  that  does  not  distort  or  impart  a  false 
coloring. 

5.  And  as  it  is  schismatic,  so,  as  a  policy,  it  is 
false.  There  can  be  no  question  that  the  growth 
and  influence  of  the  Baptist  denomination,  great 
as  they  are,  would  be  vastly  increased  were  it  not 
for  this  practice.  There  are  multitudes  of  intelli- 
gent, influential,  and  devoted  Christians,  the  land 
over,  who  are  really  Baptists,  but  who  have  no 
sympathy  for  restricted  communion,  and  on  this 
account  will  not  connect  themselves  with  Baptist 
churches.  I  do  not  blame  them.  Far  from  it; 
for  I  believe  it  better  to  seek  a  home  among  those 
who  may  differ  from  us  on  the  subject  of  baptism 
but  who  exercise  a  Christian  largeness  of  soul  and 
a  gospel  charity  toward  others,  than  among  those 
who  may  agree  with  us  upon  this  subject  while  in 
their  administrations  of  the  Lord's  supper  they 
trample  upon  the  unmistakeable  teachings  of  Scrip- 
ture, and  the  hallowed  promptings  of  the  spirit  of 
Christ.  It  is  perfectly  ridiculous  to  see  any  one 
attempting  to  show  that  "  a  Pedobaptist  church  is 
13 


146  OPEN    COMMUNION. 

no  home  for  a  Baptist,"  when  a  close-communion 
church,  as  such,  ought  to  be  a  home  for  no 
Christian,  and  when,  as  the  only  alternative 
(where  there  are  no  open-communion  churches), 
Baptists  must  seek  homes  among  churches  of  other 
denominations.  But  what  I  wanted  to  call  your 
attention  to,  is  the  fact,  that  in  consequence  of  the 
exclusive  and  belittling  character  of  this  system,  a 
large  amount  of  piety,  influence,  and  means  which 
properly  belongs  to  the  denomination,  is  turned  off 
into  other  channels.  So  that  if  the  Baptist  deno- 
mination is  less  numerous  than  it  might  be,  if  its 
influence,  both  at  home  and  abroad,  is  not  what  it 
should  be,  Baptists  have  nothing  to  blame  for  this 
more  than  their  own  dwarfing,  antichristian,  and 
odious  system  of  denominational  communion — a 
system  that  decapitates  all  non-conformists,  as 
unwarranted  as  the  papal  restrictions  of  th*r 
use  of  God's  Word,  and  as  intolerant  as  the 
spirit  that  drove  Roger  Williams,  as  a  dangerous 
man,  from  his  home.  It  goes  to  work  to  advance 
the  truth  in  the  very  way  best  calculated  to  blind 
men  to  it,  and  to  keep  them  from  examining  it. 
It  runs  directly  counter  to  the  voice  of  reason  and 
the  genius  of  Christianity,  which  teach  that  if  we 
would  win  from  error,  we  are  not  to  expect  to  suc- 
ceed by  the  use  of  harsh,  coercive,  and  repulsive 
means,  but  by  those  that  are  mild,  conciliatory, 


CONCLUDING    CONSIDERATIONS.  147 

and  attractive.  As  the  late  Dr.  Carson,  and  a 
Baptist  of  no  mean  name,  remarks,  "  Ignorance  of 
any  divine  institution  is  an  evil,  and  must  be  felt 
as  such  by  a  church  as  far  as  it  exists  in  any  of  its 
body.  But  the  question  is,  What  is  God's  way  of 
getting  rid  of  the  evil?  We  believe,"  he  says, 
"  that  it  is  by  forbearance,  affectionate  instruction, 
and  prayer.  Many  on  the  contrary  have  thought 
that  the  most  effectual  way  to  make  a  disciple 
receive  an  ordinance  of  Jesus,  is  to  refuse  him  fel- 
lowship till  he  has  complied.  Notwithstanding 
all  we  have  heard  in  favor  of  this  plan,  we  still 
deem  it  the  wisdom  of  man.  Accordingly  we 
have  found  that  God  has  made  foolish  this  wis- 
dom. Long  has  it  been  tried  without  success; 
and  of  late,  in  some  parts  of  Ireland  it  has  been 
carried  so  far  that  some  individuals  can  scarcely 
find  a  second  to  unite  with  them  in  constant  fel- 
lowship. By  permitting  Satan  to  work  them  up 
to  this  frenzy,  it  appears  to  us  that  God  has  fixed 
his  seal  of  disapprobation  on  the  sentiment  in  its 
lowest  degree,  and  would  load  sober-minded 
Christians,  who  have  been  led  away  by  its  plausi- 
bility, to  examine  more  attentively  the  ground  of 
their  opinion."* 

What  candid  and  reflecting  mind  does  not  feel 

*  Moore's  Life  of  Carson,  pp.  86,  Si. 


148  OPEN    COMMUNION. 

that  there  is  a  truthfulness  in  these  words  which 
speaks  for  itself  and  cannot  be  gainsayed  ?  The 
gospel,  by  its  loveliness  and  attractiveness,  draws 
men  into  obedience ;  but  this  system  would  drive 
them  into  it.  Overlooking  the  great  principles  in 
which  the  power  of  the  gospel  lies,  and  going  con- 
trary to  them,  it  vainly  seeks  to  bring  men  to  a 
knowledge  of  the  truth  by  setting  it  in  a  repulsive 
and  odious  light.  Such  a  system,  be  it  from  what 
source  it  may,  cannot  be  of  God. 

6.  But  one  of  the  greatest  objections  I  have  to 
the  practice,  is  that  it  desecrates  the  Lord's  supper, 
using  it  as  it  does  for  purposes  altogether  unlaw- 
ful. The  immediate  object  of  the  ordinance  is  to 
bring  before  our  minds,  by  sensible  tokens,  the 
sufferings  and  death  of  our  crucified  Lord ;  for  as 
often  as  we  partake  of  the  sacramental  loaf  and 
cup  we  make  an  exhibition  of  him  as  crucified  and 
dying ;  or,  as  the  apostle  concisely  expresses  it,  we 
show  his  death.  A  correct  administration  of  the 
ordinance  will,  therefore,  always  awaken  peni- 
tence, humility,  and  love  for  him  who  bore  our 
sins  in  his  body  on  the  tree,  as  well  as  unite  us 
more  closely  to  those  with  whom  we  commune  as 
fellow-disciples  engaged  with  us  in  the  same 
solemn  and  melting  memorial  act.  The  practice 
of  restricted  communion,  however,  awakes,  not 
unfrequently,  feelings  of  mortification  and  shame 


CONCLUDING    CONSIDERATIONS.  149 

that  need  to  be  repented  of,  and  makes  those  who 
are  truly  united  to  Christ  feel  as  though  there  was 
little  or  no  oneness  of  heart  between  them.  The 
administering  of  the  supper  in  such  a  way  as 
necessarily  to  awaken  feelings  so  little  akin  to 
those  designed  to  be  awakened  is  truly  humiliat- 
ing. It  deprives  it  of  those  lovely  and  exalting 
features  which  it  possesses  as  an  ordinance  of 
Christ,  and  makes  it  an  instrument  for  evil.  In 
its  design  the  supper  is  for  believers  as  members 
of  the  Christian  body,  not  as  members  of  a  parti- 
cular denomination.  Even  if,  under  circumstances 
that  are  perfectly  compatible  with  love  for  Christ, 
there  should  be  found  any  who  are  without  bap- 
tism, but  who,  notwithstanding  this,  are  acknow- 
ledged as  members  of  Christian  churches,  there 
can  be  no  question  that  the  supper  is  for  them  as 
truly  as  for  any  otfcer  disciples.  To  confine  it, 
under  these  circumstances,  even  to  the  baptized  is 
a  course  unjustified  by  all  the  teachings  of  Chris- 
tianity. But  when  its  restriction  is  carried  further 
than  this,  and  the  communion  is  made  a  denomi- 
national thing,  as  it  really  is,  its  administration  is 
more  than  unjustifiable ;  it  calls  for  reprehension 
from  every  Christian  as  a  course  that  degrades  the 
ordinance  and  dishonors  him  who  instituted  it. 
We  are  at  liberty  to  adopt  no  terms  of  com- 
munion not  established  by  the  Savior.  This  you 
13* 


150  OPEN    COMMUNION. 

admit.  And  yet,  contrary  to  the  precedent  left  us 
by  the  Savior  himself,  you  not  only  insist  upon  an 
immersional  profession  of  discipleship  where  disci- 
pleship  has  already  been  honestly  and  fully  entered 
upon  under  other  circumstances,  but  you  demand 
of  the  communicant  a  place  in  some  restricted- 
communion  church  before  he  and  you  can  com- 
memorate together  the  death  of  your  ascended 
Lord.  If  this  is  not  the  offspring  of  party  spirit 
it  would  be  hard  to  say  what  is.  It  is  a  desecra- 
tion of  the  Lord's  supper,  which  finds  no  parallel 
in  the  history  of  Christian  churches ;  a  tampering 
with  a  divine  institution  of  which  the  world  itself 
is  not  guilty. 

1.  Besides  all  this,  restricted  communion  is  a 
modern  innovation,  something  altogether  unknown 
till  within  the  last  three  centuries.  I^m  aware  it 
is  sometimes  said,  that  good  Jfchn  Bunyan  was  the 
father  of  the  opposite  practice.  But  they  who  say 
this  only  point  us  to  the  time  when  restricted 
communion  was  first  introduced,  and,  as  it  ex- 
tended, met  with  opposition  from  those  who  were 
imbued  with,  the  spirit  of  Christ.  For  it  was  in 
Bunyan's  time  that  Baptists  first  refused  to  com- 
mune with  others;  and  then  the  practice  origin- 
ated in  a  spirit  of  retaliation  and  party  exclusive- 
ness.  It  evidently  did  not  exist  in  the  apostles' 
days.     There  were  no  restrictions  of  the  supper 


CONCLUDING    CONSIDERATIONS.  151 

then  practised  toward  any  known  and  acknow- 
ledged Christian  brother,  as  is  daily  done  now. 
And  during  the  whole  of  the  first  two  centuries  of 
the  Christian  era  such  a  thing  was  utterly  un- 
known. If  we  come  down  to  a  later  day  and  sup- 
pose infant-baptism  to  have  been  introduced 
toward  the  end  of  the  second  or  the  beginning  of 
the  third  century,  wkich  corresponds  to  the  time 
at  which  it  is  first  distinctly  noticed ;  as  Robert 
Hall  very  justly  remarks,  we  cannot  suppose  a 
shorter  space  than  two  centuries  was  requisite  to 
procure  it  that  complete  establishment  whieh  it 
possessed  in  the  time  of  St.  Austin.  During  that 
long  interval  there  must  have  been  Baptists  and 
Pedobaptists  contemporary  with  each  other. 
What  became  of  that  portion  of  the  ancient 
church  which  refused  to  adopt  the  baptism  of 
infants  ?  Did  they  separate  from  their  brethren 
in  order  to  form  distinct  and  exclusive  societies  ? 
Of  this  not  the  faintest  trace  or,  vestige  is  to  be 
found  in  ecclesiastical  history ;  and  the  supposition 
is  completely  confuted  by  the  concurrent  testi- 
mony of  ancient  writers  to  the  universal  incorpo- 
ration of  orthodox  Christians  into  one  grand  com- 
munity. Not  the  shadow  of  evidence  ean  be  pro- 
duced to  prove  the  existence,  during  that  long 
tract  of  time,  of  a  single  society  of  which  adult 
baptism   was    the    distinguishing    characteristic. 


252  OPEN    COMMUNION. 

Terttillian,  it  is  acknowledged,  is  the  first  who  dis- 
tinctly and  unequivocall  y  adverts  to  the  baptism  of 
infants ;  and  as  he  expresses  his  disapprobation  of 
it  at  the  same  time,  without  the  remotest  intima- 
tion of  the  propriety  of  making  it  the  ground  of 
separation,  he  must  be  allowed  to  form  one 
instance  of  the  practice  of  mixed  communion  ;  and 
unless  we  are  dispos'ed  to  assert  that  infant-bap- 
tism at  once  supplanted  the  original  ordinance, 
multitudes  must  have  been  in  precisely  the  same 
situation.  Among  the  Waklenses,  for  instance,  at 
a  later  day,  we  find  that  there  were  many  who 
adhered  to  Baptist  principles,  and  were  stigmatized 
and  reproached  by  their  Romish  persecutors  as. 
Anabaptists ;  while  it  appears  also,  on  the  other 
hand,  that  there  were  not  wanting  some  among 
them  who  practised  the  baptism  of  infants.  No 
indication,  however,  is  discoverable  of  any  rupture 
in  external  communion  among  them  on  this 
account.  Indeed,  we  read  of  the  separate  exist- 
ence of  no  Baptist  churches  anywhere  upon  the 
continent  during  the  whole  period  of  the  middle 
ages,  and  until  the  time  of  the  Reformation.  The 
necessary  inference,  therefore,  is,  either  that  there 
were  during  that  interval  no  Baptists  there,  or 
rather  that  they  were  incorporated  in  societies, 
together  with  Pedobaptists.* 

*  See  R.  Hall,  Works,  vol.  i,,  pp.  481-483. 


CONCLUDING    CONSIDERATIONS.  153 

And  if  we  pass  from  the  continent  to  England, 
and  suppose  the  existence  of  Baptist  sentiments 
there  to  date  no  farther  back  than  the  days  of 
Wickliffe,  we  find  that,  for  at  least  two  centuries 
and  a  half,  close  communion  was  unknown  there. 
But  if,  as  some  suppose,  Baptists  existed  in  Eng- 
land as  far  back  as  the  beginning  of  the  seventh 
or  even  of  the  twelfth  century  ;  then  so  much  longer 
was  mixed  communion  practised  before  the 
modern  innovation  began  ;  for  during  the  period 
prior  to  Wickliffe,  if  there  were  any  Baptists  in 
England  they  were  not  known  as  such  by  distinct 
organizations.  But  whatever  may  be  the  truth 
respecting  the  existence  of  Baptist  sentiments  in 
England  before  A.  D.  1370,  it  is  certain  that  their 
prevalence  can  be  distinctly  dated  from  that  time ; 
and  yet  they  found  no  embodiment  in  Baptist 
churches  as  such,  till  several  years  after  the 
beginning  of  the  seventeenth  century.  As  on  the 
continent,  so  here,  Baptists  were  scattered  through- 
out the  country  maintaining  their  discriminating 
sentiments,  yet  mingling  with  their  Pedobaptist 
brethren  in  both  church  and  sacramental  com- 
munion. It  was  not  till  the  reign  of  Charles  L 
that  they  began  to  form  a  distinct  body  or  de- 
nomination contending  for  the  divine  authority  of 
baptism  and  the  necessity  of  it  as  a  term  of  com- 
munion.    Crosby,  in  his  history  of  the  English 


154  OPEN    COMMUNION. 

Baptists,  says  that  they  began  to  form  themselves 
into  separate  societies  in  1633,  five  years  after  the 
birth  of  John  Bunyan,  and  hardly  three  years 
before  the  banishment  of  Roger  Williams  in  this 
country.  Up  to  that  time  they  had  been  inter- 
mixed in  churches  with  other  nonconformists, 
though  during  nearly  the  whole  of  the  preceding 
reign  they  had  contended  more  or  less  strenuously 
for  their  principles  as  Baptists.  Eleven  years 
after  this,  the  whole  number  of  Baptist  churches 
in  England  was  fifty  four,  seven  of  which  were  in 
London ;  and  when  John  Bunyan  became  pastor 
of  the  church  at  Bedford  the  number  was  still 
greater.  Most  of  these  churches,  in  consequence 
of  the  opposition  which  they  received  from  others, 
refused  to  commune  with  them  altogether.  To 
some  however,  among  whom  were  John  Hum- 
phrey and  John  Bunyan,  this  course  appeared 
uncalled  for  and  unchristian,  and  they  contended 
for  the  continuance  of  that  free  intercourse  at  the 
Lord's  table  which  had  been  steadily  maintained 
between  Baptists  and  Christians  of  other  per- 
suasions from  the  first.  Restricted  communion, 
therefore,  appears  evidently  as  a  modern  innova- 
tion. It  was  a  thing  only  of  recent  date  when 
Humphrey,  in  1653,  wrote  his  u  Free  Admission 
to  the  Sacrament,"  and  Bunyan,  some  ten  years 
alter,,  his  Ci  Differences  about  Water  Baptism  no 


CONCLUDING    CONSIDERATIONS.  155 

Bar  to  Communion."  And  now  it  has  scarcely 
the  sanction  of  two  hundred  years,  and  that  from 
only  a  portion  of  the  denomination  at  any  time. 

Why  then,  since  it  is  a  thing  that  was  unknown 
to  the  apostles  and  unheard  of  in  the  Christian 
church  for  sixteen  hundred  years,  should  we  now 
seek  to  uphold  it  with  all  its  inconsistencies  and 
improprieties  ?     The  answer  can  be  found  only  in 
the  fact  that  we  do  not  recognise,  as  we  should, 
the  oneness  which  exists  between  us  and  those  of 
other   denominations    as   members  of  the   great 
Christian  brotherhood.     This  oneness  is  not  a  felt 
reality.      I  make  no  question  that  this  is  the  real 
difficulty  at  the  bottom  of  this  whole  system.     Do 
away  with  this,  and  we  shall  have  little  if  any  fel- 
low-feeling for  a  course  that  repels  them  from  us 
as  disobedient  and   rebellious.     It  is  gratifying, 
however,  to  know,  as  I  do  know,  that  there  are 
multitudes  belonging  to  our  churches  who  would 
gladly   see    the   practice   abolished,    and   would 
readily  abjure  it,  but  for  the  want  of  ministerial 
co-operation  and  sanction,  the  fear  of  being  con- 
sidered fickle-minded,  and  the  dread  of  excommu- 
nication and  unkind  treatment,  in  some  cases,  from 
those  they  love.     We  all  know  what  influence 
these  things  have  upon  minds  which  have  not,  by 
encountering  them,  learned  to  despise  them  and 
to  rise  above  them.    But  we  have  every  reason  to 


156  OPEN    COMMUNION. 

believe  that  the  day  is  at  hand  when  the  system 
of  restricted  communion  must  be  abolished,  if  not 
entirely,  at  least  to  a  very  great  extent.  Present 
indications  show  that  the  strong  tide  of  feeling 
which  for  years  past  has  been  increasing  against 
it,  cannot  much  longer  be  successfully  kept  back. 
Its  inconsistencies  and  glaring  antichristian  charac- 
ter, are  becoming  daily  more  and  more  felt.  And 
when  the  mind  of  the  denomination  is  fairly  en- 
lightened to  see  them,  it  must  come  to  the  conclusion 
that  the  system  is  not  only  uncalled  for,  but  unscrip- 
tural  and  unworthy  of  a  follower  of  Christ.  This  is 
all  we  need.  When  this  is  the  case  the  enlightened 
mind  of  the  masses  can  no  longer  submit  to  the 
dictation  of  the  few  in  favor  of  error.  The  absur- 
dity of  the  practice  and  its  inconsistency  with  itself 
and  with  the  mind  of  Christ  will  be  too  apparent 
to  leave  any  honest  and  enlightened  mind  willing 
to  be  identified  writh  it. 

And  now,  my  friend,  I  must  conclude.  I  can- 
not doubt  that  you  have  hitherto  followed  the  sys- 
tem with  a  conscience  void  of  offence  toward  both 
God  and  man,  not  having  seen  its  inconsistencies 
and  unwarrantable  character.  But  can  you  any 
longer  ?  In  view  of  the  arguments  which  I  have 
advanced,  to  say  nothing  of  others,  do  you  not  feel 
that  your  position  is  a  weak  one  ?  Would  you 
not  be  ashamed  to  have  your  character  as  a  rea- 


CONCLUDING    CONSIDERATIONS.  157 

soner  judged  of  by  your  pleadings  in  favor  of 
restricted  communion,  and  your  character  as  a 
Christian  of  catholic  views  by  your  practice  in  this 
matter  ?  I  know  you  would.  You  would  blush 
to  find  your  arguments  in  defence  of  other  ques- 
tions as  weak  and  irrelevant  as  those  you  offer  in 
support  of  this  practice.  Why  not,  then,  aban- 
don it  ?  "  If  the  system  be  not  warranted  by  the 
will  of  Christ,  it  should  be  at  once  and  forever 
abandoned."*  If  our  object  is  the  attainment  of 
truth  and  of  a  firm  and  peaceful  foothold  thereon, 
we  must  be  ready  to  admit  our  errors  and  renounce 
them  when  we  see  them.  As  Noah  and  his 
family,  by  committing  themselves  in  the  ark  to 
the  waters,  were  lifted  above  the  ruins  and  corrup- 
tions of  the  old  world  and  safely  landed  on  Ararat ; 
so  we,  by  committing  ourselves  upon  the  waters 
of  God's  truth,  shall  be  borne  upward  and  away 
from  error,  and  safely  conveyed  to  a  position  of 
firmness  and  peace.  It  is  no  evidence  of  consist- 
ency to  continue  in  error.  To  be  in  error  is  the 
common  lot  of  mankind.  To  acknowledge  and 
abandon  it  is  but  the  part  of  wisdom,  honesty,  and 
true  magnanimity.  It  may  be  humiliating  to  our 
pride  ;  but  to  be  enslaved  by  pride  and  kept  from 
breathing   the   free   and   bracing  atmosphere   of 

*  Taylor's  Defence  of  Restricted  Com. 
14 


158  OPEN    COMMUNION. 

truth,  this — this  is  most  degrading  to  the  soul. 
They  alone  are  the  truly  free  and  happy,  who, 
disdaining  the  influences  of  this  debasing  despot, 
and  enamored  with  the  truth,  follow  cheerfully 
wherever  she  leads  the  way,  knowing  that  let  her 
lead  where  and  whither  she  may,  it  will  always  be 
away  from  error  and  toward  God. 

It  is  a  most  fearful  responsibility  that  any  one 
assumes  who  imposes  false  and  unscriptural  terms 
of  communion  and  practically  forbids  from  obser- 
ving the  ordinance  those  to  whom  Christ  himself 
says,  "  This  do,  in  remembrance  of  me."  In  view 
of- what  I  have  presented,  and  as  much  more  per- 
haps which  I  might  have  presented,  I  cannot,  I 
dare  not  so  administer  the  supper  as  virtually  to 
exclude  any  who  are  visibly  his  disciples  and  who 
may  be  present  with  us  at  the  time  of  com- 
memorating his  death.  It  matters  not  to  me  how 
they  have  made  their  profession  of  Christianity  if 
I  am  satisfied  of  their  Christian  character.  Com- 
mon sense  leaches  me  that  if,  as  in  the  apostles' 
days,  there  were  but  one  way  of  administering  bap- 
tism known  among  us,  they  would  be  as  much 
Baptists  as  you  or  I ;  and  that  therefore  it  is  per- 
fectly ridiculous  to  decline  communing  with  them 
if  they  should  happen  not  to  be  immersed.  Nor 
do  I  care  where  they  hold  their  church  relations. 
Let  them  be  credit&jbie  members  of  the  Christian 


CONCLUDING    CONSIDERATIONS.  159 

fraternity,  and  neither  you  nor  I  have  any  right 
to  require  of  them  other  terms  of  approach  to  the 
Lord's  table.  If  this  is  false  ground,  I  ask  you, 
for  the  truth's  sake  and  for  our  Master's  sake,  to 
prove  it.  I  ask  not  for  sophistry,  equivocations, 
puerilities,  unscriptural  appeals,  and  party  repre- 
sentations, but  for  argument  that  will  carry  weight 
with  it  to  the  mind  of  a  thinking,  common-sense 
Christian  man  desirous  of  seeing  the  truth,  and 
abiding  by  it.  Until  this  is  afforded  me,  I  must 
not  only  claim  the  liberty  of  practising  free  com- 
munion myself,  but  insist  upon  it  as  *he  duty  of 
others,  for  a  rejection  of  which,  however,  I  judge 
no  man,  but  simply  point  to  him  whose  revealed 
will  seems  to  say  so  plainly  concerning  restricted 
communion,  "Who  hath  required  this  at  your 
hands?" 

As  ever,  in  all  sincerity, 

Yours,  &c. 


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